How DNA is helping me uncover my genetic makeup!

The Society of Australian Genealogists' "Hang Outs" are giving me the opportunity to systematically record my research and then turn it into blog posts!     Yesterday was the opportunity to tie together the stories of the past two weeks with my favourite topic - genetic genealogy.  If you've done a DNA test and would like any assistance, please contact me at the above email.  You can read the story of Jane Feeney, my second great-grandmother, HERE.  You can read the story of Anton and Margaretha Gersbach, my second great-grandparents, HERE.  I'll show how DNA is helping me find my genetic make up from Essie Woodlands, my paternal grandmother.  Genetic evidence is necessary to “prove” our pedigree. 

Louise Coakley is an Australian genetic genealogist, member of SAG and publisher of Genie1.  DNA does indeed have amazing power and I hope the information in this post demonstrates that.

Here’s my paternal grandmother’s pedigree.  Two weeks ago, I wrote about Essie’s grandmother, Jane Feeney, who arrived here in 1849 - one of over 4000 young woman who came to the colonies from Ireland as part of the “Earl Grey Famine Orphan Scheme”.  Last week, I wrote about Essie’s German grandparents, Anton and Margaret Gersbach, who arrived here in 1855. 

Throughout the post, I’ve shown the source or application I’ve used in the information presented.  For example, here I’ve used the ancestral trees tool at DNAPainter to produce this chart.

Being a DNA enthusiast, I’ve tested and have my DNA data at all the major testing companies and GEDmatch.com.  My recommendation is to test at Ancestry and, perhaps, 23andMe as you can’t upload your data to these sites and have your DNA data everywhere to play in all the ponds of matches. The downside of Ancestry is that you don’t have access to a chromosome browser which you need for more distant research beyond your 2nd great-grandparents.

Turning to our genetic breakthrough for Jane Feeney.

Back in September 2017, I was very pleased to see that I had DNA matches with 4 3rd cousins on my Killion/Feeney line.  This supported by traditional research was sufficient evidence to prove that John Killion and Jane Feeney were indeed my 2nd great-grandparents.  Both had come from Ireland in the first half of the 1800s and we all know the problems with Irish research back then.  Maybe DNA could help us?

In October 2017, along came a new match with Elizabeth - 24cM and predicated to be a 3rd cousin but no shared matches!  Liz only had a small tree but one name stood out immediately - Arthur Feeney born 1905 in Sydney.  Was this how we were connected?

Why hadn’t I ever checked for other matches with Feeney’s in their tree? I had matches with many “distant cousins” but two interested me - Helen and Sheri - because both had Sydney Feeney connections.  Helen’s tree went back to her great grandfather, William Feeney, who was born in 1856 in Sydney.  Sheri’s tree went a lot further back to her 3rd great grandparents but there were no other details for them.  Her 2nd great grandfather, Thomas Feeney, had been born in Ireland and died in Sydney.  His daughter, Ethel, was born in Sydney in 1880.

The exciting thing about these matches was that they were descended from Irish/Australian Feeney’s and we shared matches with some of my other Killion/Feeney 3rd cousins.  Could this be the connection between us?

Within a couple of hours, I’d developed what we enthusiasts call a quick and dirty tree - maybe better called a research tree.

I found that Helen was descended from Edward Feeney while Liz and Sheri were descended from Thomas Feeney.   The paper research supported them being brothers who’d arrived in Sydney in 1843 from Dublin.  On NSW BDM, both their death registrations showed their parents as Edward and Jane.  

Next thing was to get all the Australian certificates as quickly as I could for Edward and Thomas.  Of course, our Jane had called her first two sons Edward and Thomas.  She’d consistently referred to her mother as Jane but the name of her father varied but was never Edward.

We’d always had a thought that “our Jane’s” mother was in Sydney in the early 1850s because of a reference in Trevor McClaighlan’s book, Barefoot and Pregnant.  After a lot of research, it seemed the most likely candidate for this Jane Feeny was the woman referred to in the article on the top right who’d died in the Sydney Infirmary in 1852.  We established this was indeed the mother of Edward and Thomas Feeney, the many times great-grandfathers of our new Feeney DNA matches.  

Then we had Edward Feeney advertising the Killion farm on the North Shore of Port Macquarie for sale.

We needed more genetic evidence to support the relationship.  Given we were looking back to 3rd great-grandparents, we were looking for triangulation at the segment level - a more advanced genetic genealogy technique.  

A chromosome browser is needed for this and, as I said, earlier, Ancestry doesn’t have a chromosome browser.  All the matches where at Ancestry.  We’d found none at the other testing sites or GEDmatch.com.  After a lot of work, we had Liz, Helen and Sheri on GEDmatch.com.  

Then payday, Helen, Sheri and Martyn all triangulated at the same segment on Chromosome 20! 

We keep gathering evidence of the relationship.  Today we have 29 identified descendants of Jane, Edward and Thomas.  17 of these are only on Ancestry.  Pleasingly with the 12 that are at sites with chromosome browsers, we have many more segment triangulations.

Looking at my shared segments with my Feeney cousins near and far, I’ve been able to map my genetic inheritance from Jane Feeney and Margaret Killion as shown in this slide.  This is from a wonderful tool for chromosome mapping on DNAPainter.  At this point, I’ve traced back 5% of my total DNA makeup to Jane and Margaret. 

Turning to my next discovery.  Last week I said these pages from the bible of my great-grandfather, Frank Gersbach, gave me clues to the family in NSW and back in Germany.

I was confident that the five highlighted recorded deaths in Germany.

The four entries highlighted recorded the death of Frank’s maternal grandparents, Phillip and Catharina Songen, and his uncle and aunt in German.

An Ancestry search showed the death transcript for Frank’s grandmother, Catharina, and recorded her maiden name as Klumm - father Adam and mother Catharina.  New names to me but I included them in my Ancestry tree.

Last year, Ella showed as a new match on Ancestry.   We share 28cM across 2 segment and are predicted to be 4th cousins.  However, we were shown as having shared ancestors, Adam Klumm and Catharina Stein.  I did the usual traditional research to evidence the connection.  Ella’s 2nd great-grandfather, Louis Bender, had come to Australia in 1857 from Eltville.  It was looking like he was my 2nd great-grandmother, Margaret’s, first cousin.

Ella downloaded her DNA data from Ancestry and uploaded it to MyHeritage.  We shared one segment of DNA at Chromosome 16 and another at Chromosome 21.  More evidence was needed to support that these segments of my DNA was via my third great-grandmother, Catharina, from the most recent common ancestors that Ella and I share - our fourth great-grandparents, Adam Klumm, and his wife, Catharina.

Earlier this year, my match with Janice M came up at 23andMe.  This showed we shared 4 segments of DNA.  I was excited by the first one at chromosome 16 as it overlapped with Ella.  From the family background shown for Janice, I could place her in my tree.  My mantra is “know your tree, know your matches”.

I was pretty sure that Janice was my 3rd cousin with our most recent common ancestors being our 2nd great-grandparents, Anton and Margaret Gersbach.  Janice confirmed this…

I have a triangulated segment of 16.8cM at chromosome 16 with Ella, my 5th cousin, and Janice, my 3rd cousin.  I inherited this segment of DNA via Catharina, my 3rd great-grandmother, from her parents, Andrew and Catharina Klumm.

So with traditional research and genetic genealogy, I’ve proved that Adam and Catharina are my 4th great-grandparents.

In this slide, you can see my genetic pedigree that I’ve proved on my paternal grandmother’s line at this time.  They are marked DNA.  The search continues…

This slide shows my genetic inheritance from my paternal grandmother, Essie, though her parents, grandmothers and great grandmother.  Still a way to go as I’ve mapped 10% and I have inherited about 25% from Essie as one of my 4 grandparents.