200 year mystery

[gilbertdh]

There are about 700 names on the male side in our genealogy. Now, through DNA testing, I find that about 200 of them are actually not of the same blood as the rest. Back around 1810 either an adoption or other relationship resulted in a whole branch of the family descending from two brothers who bore our name, but we now know are not related by blood to the generation before. It

[Bob White]

Re: 200 year mystery

Try looking at it from the other side. I am an adoptee of the father who raised me. He married my mother when I was five years old. I have always felt that I have two families on the "male side" as you label it. I am 70+ years old and have had ongoing contact with both the "biological" and "adoptive" families most of my life. I happily track both families and feel rich in relatives. As I was raised as an only child, this is a nice place to be in.

In your case, it may not be so easy to separate even if you wanted to. In maybe 8-10 generations, there may have been marriages/liaisons between the two brother's descendants and the remainder of the descendants. Also, I'm far from expert on DNA matters but you need to answer the question of whether the results totally rule out any blood relationship. As I understand, just being different doesn't completely rule that out. Final point, which goes to how I feel about my relatives, your many relatives, past and present, have considered all of these people as part of the family -- without giving a hoot about how genealogy records people --- so can one really separate them out?

[The Wheeler Family]

Re: 200 year mystery

A good answer. I agree wholeheartedly. These people are a part of your family and need to be included in all aspects of your family history. How rich your ancestry is!

[gilbertdh]

Re: 200 year mystery

Thanks for these thoughts. It's difficult to say how this occurred, and all of the people with my name may indeed be blood relations just not through the male line. In fact, I expect that's the case. The male line of descent and who inherits the family wealth was I believe the whole point of genealogy, historically, but now it is basically family history. So, I'd like to preserve that history in some way by indicating this anomaly. 200 years ago if this were discovered I believe we'd have to strip them of the family crest and kick them out of the castle. Now it's kind of cool to find out.

Perhaps I should have asked this in the Reunion 10 forum. I already have Hall1, Hall2, and Hall3. Hall1 and Hall2 were two distinct families (at least back three generations) who intermarried and produced my grandmother. Shall I use some similar some way to distinguish the descendents of the two brothers who were not Smiths but Joneses? Make them Smith-Jones or Smith[Jones]?

David