I’m partial to the bells and whistles at 23andme and seldom check my AncestryDNA results. Today, though – eureka! An estimated 4th cousin with a Shared Ancestor Hint, John William Aldridge. I checked G.J.’s family tree and immediately knew exactly who she is – the granddaughter of one of my great-grandfather’s sisters. Our most recent common ancestors (MRCA) are John and Louvicey Artis Aldridge, and we’re actually 2nd cousins once removed.
Tag Archives: DNA
DNAnigma, no. 6.
I recognized his name immediately and shot off a message to his Ancestry.com inbox. … And then another message. … And then another one. … And still, crickets. In the meantime, I had an email from his first cousin, and I shared news of the match with her. She was excited and said she’d prod him. Apparently, he is prod-proof.
In any case, this is another match between descendants of Adam T. Artis, with an Aldridge twist. H.B.’s great-grandfather was Henry J.B. Artis, son of Adam by his fourth wife, Amanda Aldridge, who was a daughter of Robert and Eliza Balkcum Aldridge. H.B. and I are roughly 4th cousins, which Ancestry correctly predicted.
DNA Definites, no. 4.5: Simonton.
Ten years or more ago, before repeated bad brushes with poison ivy wore me out, I was a member of the Georgia Native Plant Society. Atlanta’s economy was booming, subdivisions were sprouting like nutgrass, and GNPS was dashing across the city, rescuing ferns and trillium from the bulldozer’s scrape. I showed up for the last time at a site just southwest of the city, trailing plastic bags and a shovel. The owner of the parcel stopped by, and I stopped dead when I heard her name. “Simonton?” I said. “Your family wouldn’t be from Iredell County, North Carolina, would they?” She confirmed that they were, adding that they descended from a Theophilus Simonton. I laughed and exclaimed, “Hey! We’re probably distant cousins! I think I’m descended from him, too!” Small world, we agreed, and she went on her way.
A couple of months ago, my mother got a new match on 23andme — “M. Simonton.” Simonton! I contacted her and quickly established that she is descended from Theophilus Simonton of Ireland, then Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, then Iredell County NC. M. told me that her sister lived in Georgia and, on a hunch, I did a quick search of my Family Tree Maker tree. There — the very same M. Simonton and her sister S., who was indeed the woman whose family land I’d scoured for crane’s foot geraniums and astilbe.
——
My line of descent from Theophilus Simonton, who died in 1757: Magdelene Simonton > Theophilus Allison > Thomas Allison > Mary Allison > Thomas Nicholson > J. Lee Nicholson > Harriet Nicholson > Lon Colvert > Margaret Colvert > my mother. M. and S.’s line of descent from Theophilus: Robert Simonton > Adam Simonton > Abner Simonton > Albert Simonton > Adam Simonton > William Simonton > their father.
DNAnigma, no. 3: An Artis match, after all.
I was geeked. After all, my great-great-great-grandfather Adam T. Artis had 25+ children, and I have thousands of cousins in their descendants. (Not to mention the descendants of Adam’s many siblings.) I was crestfallen, then, when H.A. responded that he was descended from Absalom Artis, through Warren Artis, then Henry, then Alonzo, then William Henry Artis. I know the Absalom Artis line (though I didn’t know Warren was in it), and I have no known connection to them. Absalom was born in Virginia circa 1780 and was in northern Wayne County by the early 1800s. He and Adam lived in close proximity, but the record gives no clue to other links. Of course, ultimately, all of the free colored Artises in Wayne County – indeed, throughout Virginia and NC and out into Indiana and Ohio – were likely kin, but the links are so remote that reconstructing them is likely impossible. H.A. and I share enough DNA that our common ancestor had to have been within the last 5 generations or so. In other words, more recent than any common ancestor of Adam and Warren or Absalom.
But then….
While reviewing my notes for a post about Adam’s second set of children, I was reminded that his daughter Mary Jane Artis had married an Artis. Henry Artis. Son of Warren and Pearcy Artis. And mystery solved! H.A. and I are not related through his patrilineal Artis line, but via a wife whose father was my great-great-great-grandfather.
DNAnigma, no. 2: Armwood????
There was a woman at home whom we called Cousin Inez. She had been born down in Dudley a few years after my grandmother, and we thought that connection was what motivated her insistence that we were kin. When I began my genealogical sleuthing, I discovered that Cousin Inez had been born an Armwood — another link, though not a blood one. The second wife of my great-great-great-great-grandfather James Henderson had been Louisa Armwood. I am not descended from her, but many of my cousins are. So, cousin-ish, but not actually kin.
Then, a couple of months ago, Ancestry.com pegged me as a 4th-6th cousin to a woman I’ll call A.G. This surprised me on two counts. (1) I’d recently “met” A.G. on a cousin’s family page on Facebook. A.G. and my cousin D. are related via the Simmonses, a free family of color centered in southern Wayne County. I’m not a Simmons – that I know of – but D. and I are 3rd cousins and some change via Lewis Henderson. (2) A.G. is an Armwood! Her ancestor William Armwood, son of Major and Eliza Armwood and born about 1835, married Martha “Matta” Simmons, daughter of William and Penny Winn Simmons, in Sampson County. This is William:
So, what are the possibilities? What do we know?
- A 4th to 6th cousin relationship suggests a common ancestor in the early 1800s. (Ancestry estimates very conservatively, so we may be closer.)
- The relationship is almost certainly on my father’s side.
- All of A.G.’s mother’s lines, back to the mid-1800s, were in the Wayne/Duplin/Sampson County area.
- I have focused on her Armwood and Simmons lines because they are most familiar and intersect mine indirectly, but I may be making unwarranted assumptions.
- A.G.’s Simmons line includes Wynn/Winn and Medlin lines. And I don’t know the maiden name of Major Armwood’s wife.
- My Hendersons did not arrive in the area until the 1850s. I’ll eliminate them.
- For the time being, I’ll eliminate my Euro-descended lines.
- My Hagans line was probably from Nash County. I’ll eliminate them, too.
- A.G. has a Yelverton line from northern Wayne County. Perhaps an Artis or Seaberry connection?
- My Aldridge and Balkcum lines began with white women who bore children by black or mixed-race men circa 1820-1830 in Duplin and Sampson County. Is one of these unknown fathers the link to A.G.?
Scuffalong: Genealogy. 