Attempting to Solve Family Mysteries Through Ancestry DNA
Many years ago, my husband and I were told by his mother that he has an older brother that she had put up for adoption before he was born. We figured if this information was true, then he may have taken an Ancestry DNA test at some point, or would in the future. That is why my husband decided to do an Ancestry DNA test.
His closest DNA match is his Aunt. However, he didn’t recognize any of his next 4 closest matches! After contacting each of them, we learned they were all adoptees! After searching through old yearbooks, we found that three of the adoptees that knew of their birth mother were in high school with 2 of his Great Uncles around the times they were all born. We had no idea!
We did know that his Great Aunt had put a female child up for adoption, and had hoped to find her one day. At that time, we didn’t have contact with my husband’s father’s cousins, and didn’t know that she had made contact. We were able to find out that the child his Great Aunt had put up for adoption was classmates with his Uncle. Now all of them are in contact with each other.
We didn’t recognize his next closest match, either.
After speaking with the woman who submitted this unknown woman’s DNA, we unraveled a mystery for her family that we didn’t know existed in his family! It turned out that my husband’s Great-Grandfather had been adopted into the Young family. His birth name was William Herman Crabtree.
When William Herman Crabtree was 2 months old, his father, John Harvey Crabtree, passed away unexpectedly.
William Herman “Crabtree” Young was adopted by his father’s sister, Vernilla Jane Crabtree, who married Charles Payton Young. His birth mother, Lucinda Mary Etta Castle (spelling varies) remarried sometime between 1905–1907 and had 13 more children. Her youngest child was born in 1931. All of her children knew about their older brother that had been adopted, but had wondered about his life and his family. My husband’s DNA test was the key to answering their questions! We were able to combine our family trees and learn all about each other. The DNA match was the youngest of the other 13 children, and she is still alive at 91 years old. We were happy that she was able to learn about her older brother’s life with our research!!!
I took an Ancestry DNA test as well. I was surprised at the differences between the amount of 4th cousins or closer that we had.
I decided to check into why our numbers were so different! It turns out, his 4th Great-Grandfather had at least 27 children in Kentucky in the 1800’s. Some say up to 63 children.
My husband has 235 and 147 DNA matches to these 4th Great-Grandparents compared to the 2 and 2 DNA matches I have to my 4th Great-Grandparents. I only have 1–2 DNA matches for the rest of my 4th Great-Grandparents. He has anywhere from 1–30 DNA matches to the rest of his Great-Grandparents.
While we haven’t solved our initial mystery yet, it has been great to solve other family mysteries in the process and connect lost family members with each other! We downloaded our raw DNA files and uploaded them to GEDMatch and followed the process to “opt-in” to assist law enforcement. We encourage everyone who takes a DNA test to do the same. It could help solve a case!
