Tracing Ancestry and Surprising Finds
For several years, I had an ancestry.com account; well, I suppose I still have the account, but after spending a better part of a decade and paying $150-$200 per year for access to global documentation, I decided to halt my research. I can still contact people and I can still view family trees / make other family trees if I choose. I simply cannot view government documents anymore. I had my DNA done; several of my cousins and uncles did as well. Some of the results are interesting; others not surprising whatsoever. DNA tracing is not perfect, and it’s not fully understood yet, even though it’s understood better now than it was when I first did it. I don’t know if DNA will ever be completely understood quite honestly. My uncles that did the DNA tracing all got 1% Cameroon, Congo & Western Bantu Peoples and I found that extremely interesting. However, I think that digging into documents and artifacts revealed far more than the DNA tracing; my DNA was pretty predictable. With names like LeBeau, Hétu, Geromette, Audet, Campeau, Mahieu, etc... I think you get the point; it was rather obvious that French would be the largest percentage. The Scotland, Ireland, and England are from my Grandpa Adams and the 2% Swedish is likely from my Grandma Miner whom was also English and Irish.
An example of interesting things found is my second great uncle [Edward] that married a black, Haitian woman [Cassa] in 1893 and in the 1900 US census, it showed them living with his parents in Menominee, MI. In the 1930 US census, it showed Edward as being an “inmate” in Brown County, WI Institution [more or less an insane asylum]. The documents showed him still married [not divorced, not widowed] and that he was there for “general” maladies. Cassa disappeared from the census altogether [I even checked to see if she and the 2 children fled to Canada and they had not] and wonder if they received assistance from the nearby Native American reservation. I’m thinking that they were hiding on the reservation. It’s also on my father’s side that I found a direct lineage from a woman named Annonantak, an Ouendat [aka Wyandotte /Wyandot and otherwise known as Huron] woman TWICE. She’s my 8 th and 10 th great grandmother. She was married three times (outlived them all) and had children by the first and third husbands and I’m related through a child from each of those marriages.
I found Audet’s (Odette in the US) on both sides of my family and after some digging, I found out that brothers from one household married sisters in a neighboring household. That type of thing seemed to happen quite recently too; my great grandmother [who died when I was 3] married Armand Odette and her sister Pearl [died when I was 12] married Lloyd Odette [brother of Armand]. I also found out that a lot of the street names in the greater Detroit area are named after family. I then, discovered family names in a Wyandotte City History book. It’s really amazing seeing things like that. My mother’s family fought along side Chief Pontiac. Some of them even associated with Tecumseh. I find it astonishing that they never left this area... I didn’t feel quite at home until I moved into Wyandotte; maybe it’s because we’re meant to be here.
I enjoy finding relatives too. Through the DNA stuff, I’ve talked to a lot of relatively close cousins; some of whom I have never met but used to play at my great grandmother’s house with my mother and her siblings. Or on my father’s side, people I’d met when I was little, but have no real recollection of it. One of these days, I might have to pony up some more money to see if I can find more, but for now, I’m saving my money. I’ve gotten really quite far.
Have you ever traced your family into the 1500s? If so, what did you find?
**NO POLITICS**
Any fun or interesting finds for you?
My weirdest one was a father and son. They came from England to seek their fortunes and failed miserably. They got on a ship back to England and it sank off the coast near NJ. They were 2 of the few who survived and never left the 'Colonies' again.
I have an ancestry account too. I was able to trace some of my family back to the 1700’s. I found dozens of documents, marriage certificates, death certificates, birth records etc... Most of the older ones are in Italian and I only know the swear words so I can’t read them. Any translators on here? 😁
I'm betting I could find someone that I work with that knows Italian. I work for a global company and while we don't have any office in Italy, my coworkers travel all over Europe because it's inexpensive for them (40€) and I'm willing to bet someone knows Italian.
That would be pretty cool. Most of them you can make out important information, names, dates and so on. I have my great grandfather’s birth record that I would be interested in reading.
Ojibwe, Ojibwe, Ojibwe
Nooooo... imagine that.
My grandfather (paternal) was born between 1875 and 1880. I remember him well and told me much of our history including some of the Indian Wars. He was a participant in one of the last battles. The Battle of Sugar Point, Leech Lake MN. 1898. The Pillager band of Ojibwe defeated the US 3rd Infantry.
I actually have one of the weapons that he used in that battle.
In your neck of the woods, I had a relative that was a member of Company K, 1st Michigan Sharpshooters, an all Indian company (Three Fire Nations) that fought in many Civil War battles, one of the most notable was ''The Battle of the Crater''.
That's so awesome.
I wondered if it would even be able to do anything for me.
My father was adopted, I don't know if they would be allowed to see such records.
Depends on if any of the family members that knew about the adoption are still alive.
Only my father, and he doesn't want to find out.
Makes sense to me. If I was "given up" I don't think I'd really care about my blood family either.
I did this about ten years ago and opened an ancestry account.
A lot of information can be found and luckily one of my distant relatives had already done a lot of work on it and I only had to copy hers. For my mother's side anyways. My father's side I couldn't find anything too far back and I doubt I would. He came from a dirt poor family and many of the crop workers prior to his generation didn't even register births. I couldn't find anything for my paternal grandparents.
My mother's family came from Germany in area called Wurttemberg. My great great grandfather Joseph was born there in 1831 and he was the first to move to the US in 1851 only 20 years old and all by himself. At that time Germany was ruled by a King and I guess the conditions where very poor. A year later his brother joined him. Both of them worked their way to the Illinois area and settled there.
It is interesting to see your ancestors birth certificates, marriage certificates, draft registrations, cemetary plots, census records. I have a copy of Joseph's registration for the Civil War. Also his immigration papers and his registration on his ship from Holland. And I have a copy of my grandfather's WW1 registration.
I have not had a DNA test done but I am positive my mother is mostly German descent. Germans in the US only married other Germans, at least in my family, up until my mother's generation I have no idea what my father is.
I think it's neat too.
It is and I enjoyed sharing it with my family. There where many things my mother didn't know and now my kids have a written history.
I've spent a fair amount of time on this over the years and it's an interesting hobby for those who like history. It's makes connection a little more personal. I've taken the ancestry DNA test and it's results were as expected, 95% Irish, with 5% Scottish. I can't trace my relatives back past the early part of the 19th century, in part because the Irish civil records were destroyed in during the Irish Civil War and church records really didn't exist because of the persecution of the Church. But there were no surprises in my lineage, the cousins identified by Ancestry as sixth, seventh or eighth cousins all trace their lines to the ancestors I expected. The biggest "surprise" I learned was that my Dad had a cousin he didn't know about. His uncle fathered a child as a teenager and the mother's family put the child up for adoption. When he came of age, my great uncle married the mother who was on her deathbed supposedly never having recovered from giving up her child. My father knew none of this, but after learning he was adopted as an adult the adopted cousin returned to the neighborhood 50 years later and found the person who'd lived their the longest and she filled him in on the backstory. He ended up contacting me through ancestry, as a match. Sure enough, the records show my great uncle getting married to the mother days before she died.
My most famous relative confirmed by Ancestry is Daniel O'Connell, the liberator. He was the "uncrowned King of Ireland" for the first half of the 18th Century. But I've found the most interesting thing is seeing how my ancestors and cousins have dispersed across America and the roles they've played, whether fighting in the Civil War straight off the boat, or participating the Fenian Invasion of Canada following it. One of my ggg grandfathers was a policeman in Chicago who made the front page of the Chicago Tribune after arresting a US Marshall and subsequently being arrested by US Marshalls while trying to keep Republicans from voting in the 1880 Presidential election. One branch of the family I didn't know about moved to Brooklyn, and spawned a pretty good prizefighter whose career was ruined after he was injured pushing a woman out of the way of a streetcar. There's alot of inspiring stories and a lot of tragic ones and random brushes with history. A distant cousin removed Abraham Lincoln out of the range of sniper fire during the Battle of Fort Stevens.
It's a great way to gain perspective on your family and history. I'd advise anyone to take the test and put your tree up on Ancestry.
I agree. Even the "dirty" family information is interesting at least.