X-chromosome DNA, commonly called X-DNA, is an important component of genetic genealogy, yet it seems to receive considerably less attention today than it once did. I suspect that part of the reason is simply accessibility. Many DNA testers do not have easy access to information about their X-DNA matches. Nevertheless, X-DNA should not be ignored …
Was Albert and Alfred the Same Person?
One of the many challenges of genealogy is dealing with names. Variations in spelling are common, but researchers must also account for nicknames, middle names, aliases, and even individuals who appear in records under two entirely different given names. This case presented exactly that possibility. As I traced the history of a likely relative named …
Artificial Intelligence and Genetic Genealogy
My mother's great-grandmother, Louisa “Lue” Bobo Danner, was born on January 21, 1842, on the plantation of Dr. William J. Bobo in Union County, South Carolina. She was the eldest of the many children born to Clarissa Bobo, an enslaved woman on the Bobo plantation. Around 1859, Dr. Bobo relocated to Panola County, Mississippi, bringing …
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Artificial Intelligence and Enslaved Ancestral Research
When I recently made the breakthrough discovery involving the family of my 3rd-great-grandmother, Flora Davis, in which I wrote here, it prompted me to revisit the research I had conducted years earlier on her husband, my 3rd-great-grandfather, Jack Davis Sr. of Panola County, Mississippi. I originally documented that investigation in a blog post published on …
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Hitting Pay Dirt: Mama Flora’s Family
Last week, I made a remarkable discovery. Quite unexpectedly, I learned that after the Civil War, my great-great-grandfather Hector Davis's brother, George Burnett, returned to South Carolina to reunite with his wife and children, leaving his parents, Jack and Flora Davis, and his siblings behind in northern Mississippi. Until then, I had no idea what …
Uncle George Went Back to South Carolina
Wednesday evening began like so many others. I logged into my DNA accounts to see whether any new matches had appeared. One match immediately caught my attention. "KM" shared 44 cM across three segments with my mother, 37 cM with me, and 28 cM with my mother’s brother. AncestryDNA correctly identified her as a maternal …
A Sheriff’s Sale Record Solves a Genetic Genealogy Mystery
This morning, after breakfast and a good cup of coffee, I felt an urge to do some genealogy research. More specifically, I felt drawn to revisit my Danner family line. The feeling seemed to come out of nowhere, and as many genealogists can relate, it made me wonder if perhaps the ancestors were giving me …
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It’s Now Making Sense After 25 Years!
More than two decades ago, I had the privilege of connecting online with the late Henrietta McGrew Holland of Kalamazoo, Michigan. I no longer remember exactly how our paths first crossed, but genealogy brought us together. She may have come across one of my many posts mentioning that my mother’s family was from Tate and …
Another Huge Discovery with FamilySearch’s Full Text Tool
When I began researching my family history in 1993, one of the first major discoveries I made was locating the death certificate of my mother’s maternal great-grandmother, Lucy Milam Davis of Panola County (Como), Mississippi, at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Lucy died on November 17, 1927, at approximately 80 years of age. …
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Uncle Nicholas Johnson was in my Backyard
My father’s great-grandmother, Jane Parrott Ealy of Leake County, Mississippi, was born around 1829 in Lunenburg County, Virginia. Her enslaver, Rev. William Parrott, transported Jane, along with her parents and siblings, to Mississippi shortly before 1840. While researching the court records of William Parrott and those of his wife’s family—Elizabeth Johnson Parrott—I discovered that Jane’s …
Roots Revealed 