Not a “potential descendant”
Dear AncestryDNA,
No, actually, I’m not a “potential descendant” of Simon Shew.
I don’t know how I can make it any clearer in my family tree — and I don’t know that you’d care if I did — but Simon isn’t one of my ancestors.
You can put me in as many circles as you want, but that isn’t going to change the fact that — have I said this already? — Simon isn’t one of my ancestors.
Now I’m not disputing that Simon’s descendants and I ought to be sharing a fair chunk of DNA. But it isn’t because of even the slightest possibility that I am a “potential descendant” of Simon Shew.
It is, instead, because of who Simon Shew’s parents were — and who his wife’s parents were — and the fact that all four of those people are in fact my ancestors while Simon and his wife are not.
Got that?
Let’s look at the paper trail here.
Once upon a time, in western North Carolina, a man named Boston Shew married a woman named Elizabeth Brewer. He took out a marriage bond in Wilkes County in October 1816;1 later census records support the conclusion he and Elizabeth actually did marry.2
By 1820, Boston had two children under age 10 in his household — one boy and one girl.3 By 1830, there were two boys and four girls.4 In 1840, there were three boys and five girls.5
By 1850, Boston had moved his family to Cherokee County, Alabama. There, the census and other evidence lets us put names on the sons who had been so steadily recorded as tick marks in earlier years: Simon, the first-born, born around 1819 in North Carolina;6 Daniel, the second son, born around 1826 in North Carolina.7
Simon and Daniel met and married local girls and were enumerated side-by-side on the 1850 census. By that 1850 census, Simon and his wife Sarah already had three children: Charlsey, age 3; Emily age 2; and two-month-old Nancy. Daniel and his wife Margaret had one child, one-year-old William.
The families were still enumerated living side-by-side on the 1860 census of Cherokee County — but with huge changes. Simon and Sarah had added a passel of children: Charlsey, Emily and Nancy were joined by John, Elias, Amanda, Lucinda and Henry.8 Their cousin William had picked up two siblings — Gilford and Martha Louise — but they had lost their father. Margaret was shown as head of that household in 1860.9
So where do I fit in? I descend from Martha Louise. Daniel’s daughter. Not Simon’s. Daniel is my third great grandfather. Simon is my 3rd great granduncle. Their parents — Boston and Elizabeth (Brewer) Shew — are one set of my fourth great grandparents. Any Shew genes that I share with any of Simon’s descendants come from common descent from Boston and Elizabeth.
So why am I in a circle with Simon Shew’s descendants at AncestryDNA?
Because AncestryDNA sees two things: (1) there are a whole lot of people who descend from Simon who share a whole lot of DNA with me; and (2) Simon is in my tree and in theirs.
What AncestryDNA doesn’t see is what’s not in the trees of most of Simon’s descendants.
What’s not in those trees is that Simon’s wife is the sister of Daniel’s wife. Sarah (Battles) Shew and Margaret (Battles) Shew were sisters, children of William and Ann (Jacobs) Battles.
Most family trees show Sarah’s maiden names as Botten — a misreading of the death certificate of Sarah’s son Elias Grogan Shew. It’s indexed that way on Ancestry10 — but the original clearly reads Battles.11
In other words, all of Simon’s and Sarah’s children were double-cousins to all of Daniel’s and Margaret’s children — and all descendants on both sides can be expected to show a closer genetic relationship as a result.
And that in a nutshell is why DNA by itself doesn’t solve family mysteries. Only when it’s combined with the paper trail does it become evidence.
SOURCES
- Wilkes County, North Carolina, Marriage Bond, 1816, Boston Shew to Elizabeth Brewer; North Carolina State Archives, Raleigh. ↩
- See e.g. 1850 U.S. census, Cherokee County, Alabama, population schedule, 26th District, p. 6(A) (stamped), dwelling/family 75, Boston Shew household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 12 July 2002); citing National Archive microfilm publication M432, roll 3. ↩
- 1820 U.S. census, Wilkes County, North Carolina, population schedule, p. 494 (stamped), Boston Shew household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 25 July 2002); citing National Archive microfilm publication M33, roll 83. ↩
- 1830 U.S. census, Wilkes County, North Carolina, p. 335 (stamped), Boston Shew household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 14 July 2002); citing National Archive microfilm publication M19, roll 125. ↩
- 1840 U.S. census, Grayson County, Virginia, p. 305 (stamped), Boston “Shoe” household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 20 Nov 2011); citing National Archive microfilm publication M704, roll 555. ↩
- 1850 U.S. census, Cherokee Co., Ala., pop. sched., 27th District, p. 136(B) (stamped), dwelling/family 1054, Simon Shew. ↩
- Ibid., dwelling/family 1055, Danl Shew. ↩
- 1860 U.S. census, Cherokee County, Alabama, Division 1, population schedule, p. 315(A) (stamped), dwelling/family 828, Simon “Shoe” household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 23 May 2015); citing National Archive microfilm publication M653, roll 5. ↩
- Ibid., dwelling/family 829, Margaret “Shoe” household. ↩
- See “Alabama, Deaths and Burials Index, 1881-1974,” entry for E Grogan Shew; Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 23 May 2015). ↩
- Alabama State Board of Health, Death Certificate No. 16698, E. Grogan Shew, 14 July 1934; Bureau of Vital Statistics, Montgomery. ↩
So true… I have two of these potential ancestors. One is a suggested 3rd great-grandfather, but actually a grandson of the couple who are actually my ancestors. In the other case, Ancestry has identified the husband of my 3rd great-aunt…but left her out of the equation! I can’t imagine what conclusions I might draw if I didn’t have a paper trail.
>> I can’t imagine what conclusions I might draw if I didn’t have a paper trail.
Worth repeating, because this is exactly the problem here…
Very true! I think the paper trail is the first thing that needs to be completed. There is a difference between “being related” and “descended from” that seems to be on it’s way to being synonymous. And I can already see from my own experiences that family genealogist newbies are looking at DNA as a short cut to building a family tree beyond what they copied from Ancestry family trees. Just like other things that become too automated, skills become secondary.
>> There is a difference between “being related” and “descended from”
Another “worth repeating” comment!!
Thank you and Amen!!
There is a certain individual, “David,” who happens to be a first cousin of a good friend of mine. My Mom and my Dad each share some DNA with him, but, mitosis and meiosis being what they are, I share an even larger chunk of DNA with him than either of my parents. According to Ancestry DNA logic, shouldn’t my parents be pegged as my descendants?
Now wouldn’t that be a hoot…
Thank you for sharing this. I have an “Ancestor Discovery” that drives me nuts — I share some DNA with some (not all) of his known descendants according to the DNA circle, but there is no evidence for his inclusion in my family tree. But there IS some evidence that his WIFE and her family are related to me… except that these family trees being what they are (more paternal line friendly) the Ancestry algorithm pinpointed the wrong person!
Which just goes to prove that a brain is better than any algorithm!
Great clarification Judy. As always our research tools have to be critically assessed to determine the correct genealogical outcome.
Always, Pauleen. Anything we rely on has to be checked as many ways as possible.
Judy, I feel your pain. I did right up until the end where you wrote “DNA by itself doesn’t solve family mysteries. Only when it’s combined with the paper trail does it become evidence.”
That begs the question, what is evidence? I turned to Evidence Explained where on page 822 it is written “evidence: information that is relevant to the problem. ….” Certainly DNA is relevant in this case, it’s the way it’s interpreted that causes trouble.
And, does a single piece of evidence ever “solve family mysteries”?
John, you’re right that the word I should have used, with greater precision, is “proof.”
Yes, Judy, I too have those double cousins and AncestryDNA is indicating I am kin in very wrong fashion – to the wife to whom I am no kin at all. I really have to wonder at the future of online family trees. Ancestry is so frustrating – both their erroneous DNA connections and the ease of connecting to family trees ad nauseam that have so much wrong. Their ads make it seem effortless – which is true if you don’t care whether those people were really your kin or not. Paper trail, documentation …please!
Paper trail documentation with the DNA is best of all, Kay. The point I was trying to make here was that, without the paper trail, DNA by itself can be terribly misleading.
I do note that in the NAD short blurb by AncestryDNA states: “These are potential new ancestors OR RELATIVES who are not already in your family tree” [emphasis added.]
I suppose “New Ancestor Discovery” is an awkward and incomplete name but something like “Relatives Who Are of Special Genealogical Interest”, which while more semantically accurate, is even more awkward (RWAoSGI?)
If I might quibble with something you wrote: “Only when it’s combined with the paper trail does it become evidence.” Clarifying, you mean “evidence” of the historical (familial) relationship. The genotypes by themselves even without (written) records are evidence – evidence of recent shared ancestors in the case of shared identical regions on chromosomes.
John Reid already (correctly) took me to task for that tagline. Anything can be evidence if it bears on our research question; it’s only proof at a certain point in the reliability spectrum. So in this case the DNA is evidence of a relationship, but not proof of this relationship.
And this was not one of the New Ancestor Discovery circles (I have those too, now). This was offered as a regular circle.
Thank you for making the DNA issue so clear.
Thanks for the kind words.
Hi Judy. I’m in the Shew family and find that almost all relatives believe there is an “Indian” very closely related. I have not found this in my research. My great grandfather was Guilford Shew. Thank you for all the help you’ve always given me.
Hi, Pam! Yeah, there are those “native American” stories in every single southern family — and no, not a shred of evidence anywhere.
Thanks for writing this, Judy!
I too have had Ancestry DNA do this in my “circles”. The first potential one they sent to me was correct, Isaac White and Sarah White nee Vaughn are my direct ancestors, but I already knew that from previous work. Recently, they have sent me two different names of supposedly related husband and wives that I do not even have the same last names on ANYWHERE in my work (for those generations and for the ones immediately before and after)and I’ve been working very hard on my family tree for the last two years (especially the generations and places around the time that these AncestryDNA Circle individuals are to have lived). I’m thinking, as you did, that possibly these couples had a female that is a relation to one of my direct ancestors/relations, such as a sibling, or perhaps even an Aunt or Uncle of one of my direct ancestors/relations, who married into one of these families and that I have not found that link yet (and may not be looking for it at this time, although I’m getting some great results in general on researching siblings of direct ancestors/relations that are breaking some walls I’ve hit, particularly in my colonial Virginia and Tennessee research, as well as information from the US Census of 1850 and later decades where individual females are listed by name).
Simone Bennett
With luck at least the people they link us to will be relatives of some stripe — even if it’s just to collaterals.
“And that in a nutshell is why DNA by itself doesn’t solve family mysteries. Only when it’s combined with the paper trail does it become evidence.”
Only when combined with an AncestryDNA Circle did it generate false information.
Thank you for explaining that so well. I’ve just done AncestryDNA’s spit test, along with my parents (birthday present), and I’m trying to learn as much as I can to avoid creating problems for myself. This was very helpful. Thank you for sharing! I’ve included this post in my NoteWorthy Reads post for this week: http://jahcmft.blogspot.com/2015/05/noteworthy-reads-15.html
Thank you for the kind words!
I cannot thank you enough. I have the same situation–detailed, documented research for most of my ancestors and then out of nowhere this ‘match’ to a man who Ancestry states should be in my tree. No, he should not, but his ancestors probably should. And, like you, I have three families who have a couple of intermarriages, but only the men are known, at least, in the 1760-1800 period, in VA and NC. So, it’s the female line that has provided the connection, but Ancestry and trees have no female information. I was doubting my reasoning, but your article has given me hope that I’m on the right track. Dee Dee
You sound like you’re on the right track to me — good luck!
In my opinion, Ancestry has done a disservice to solid research with their “leaves” and the ability to attach anything to a tree. I may have a DNA match to two descendants of a man born in NC in 1821, but Ancestry just assumes that because those two people have only one name in common in their respective trees, that man had to be my ancestor as well. Anyone with half a brain knows that most of the trees were copied from one another. I finally put my tree on Ancestry because every other tree listing my grandfather was wrong–it was easy to see that most had copied from one another and had attached “documentation” that didn’t support the connections.
So, with only a message from Ancestry telling me about this man in NC and understanding the poor quality of many trees, I was seriously wondering about continuing to look for a connection. I do appreciate your explanation and support.
Ancestry trees are both a blessing and a curse. A curse because they’re so often inaccurate. But a blessing because they do often provide a clue we might have missed otherwise.
My original name is Shew. There was aproblem along the line somewhere and they changed it to Schew. Why? I don’t know.