Genealogy > Thom(p)son DNA Project

DNA Success Stories

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uneven:
If you already have an account at FTDNA I think you can order their Family Finder test and get equivalent information to what you would see at 23 and me as far as ancestry goes. Then You can load those results into Gedmatch.com and match up with people who tested with 23 and me to get a bigger picture.

One thing I did get that was interesting from 23 and me was the health assessment. So you can see (for instance ) that you might have decreased odds of colon cancer or that you are more likely to have slow or fast twitch muscles. Things I didn't appreciate at first but they kind of explain a lot of things.

One thing I dislike about 23 and Me's interface is the contact process. Because of the nature of the information out there (like your odds of different cancers) people obviously want everything very secure, but some of the settings are confusing. I have 623 matches on some level and only 20 of them have even a basic surname list. I can't even see how our genes match without contacting them first. So things take more time. I realize that it protects everyone's privacy but it is a pretty drawn out process.

Dusevoir:

--- Quote from: uneven on June 08, 2011, 06:54:55 PM ---Thank you too for doing the leg work and sharing out your tree. I think it was much easier because we were both willing to explore all the options. Hey along those lines. How many Smiths do you have in your tree?

--- End quote ---

I went to see if I had any Smiths in my tree and then I forgot.  Sorry.

I found two.

Karolyn Ruth Smith b. 1931 Milford, MA and d. 1999 in Arizona.  She married Donald Tinkham in 1951
Gertrude E. Smith and she married David Gordon Osborne b. 1905 MA.

My great uncle from MA sent me this extended tree years ago and I hope to add it to my tree soon.

rustycan:
In the last week or so I have had contact from another Cousin from the USA. 

My first major hit after a half dozen 12 markers and a couple of 25 markers. Some who wouldn't even answer my E/Mails.

Possibly they think 'how could we possibly have kin in Australia' . My line emigrated to Oz in 1844 (from Ireland) 

Well try a 37 and 65 marker (think I have those numbers right). This Thompson family had been in the Americas before 1800 and they have been trying to confirm an Irish or Scottish link by researching for fifty years.  I was able to forward many documents confirming our shared Irish links together with Scotts heritage.

Still a lot of dots to join but I am starting to have some success in Ireland particularly Donegal where many of the Scottish Border Clans found some peace and rebuilt their lives post 1610 AD.  For instance the Donegal Flax Growers and Linen spining indursties have significant numbers of Armstrongs as well as Thom(p)sons

rus t

uneven:
Wow that's great! I've also had a hard time getting responses back when my contacts aren't open to the possibilities. For others though, I'm the only person who ever contacted them and they are excited to hear from me. That's when things usually come together.

rustycan:
Well this was money well spent. I now have a forth group of cousins in the US that are 67 Marker Matches. Three of the names I have found in close proximity to where my direct line lived in Milford, Donegal, Ireland.
Two of these can trace their direct lines via their Grandmothers to Archiebald Diary Thompson a third still carries the T Surname and his line is pretty well established to Archie's brother George. The latest cousin is of a Gillespie line. I haven't ventured to far down that track as yet.

The common link to these Surnames, in Ireland, appears to be the Flaxgrowing and Linnen weaving industries which were the backbone of Donegal's commerce in the 17 th and 18 th Centuary.
 
Within the Flax Growers records is also the majority unification of the spelling of the T name with the wet (p).  Donegal was Scotts province of Ulster during the Plantation times.  The 'Plantationers' who originally carved up the Irish landholdings in Donegal were all Scotts with a couple of Irish (Loyal to the Crown for the time being) in the southwest. Zero English. So either a larger bunch of English T's migrated to Donegal to take up farming during the Irish Uprising which lasted from 1641 to 1685, in which between ten and twenty thousand Plantationers and their support staff were murdered or an English educated scribe/clerk decided to add the P. The Irish tried pretty hard to get their country back and it was not untill Cromwell reduced a couple of Townlands to dust before they were finally subdued (well for a while). It is was more complicated than that........

The reason Donegal held up better than most during the 1641 rebellion was due to the ability of the two Scotts Stewart families to raise a significant milita. One Stewart from Ramelton and the other from Mt Stewart (near Newtowncunningham).  A long winded story but suffice to say they dealt the native Irish some serious grief.

What has this got to do with DNA Studies ? Nothing actually except I have been able to establish the concentration of the Thom(p)son name in Ireland in the 1600's. There were only four Thompson names (that made the 1650ish Census) in Donegal and the bulk of their surviving descendents migrated to the American Colonies in the 1700's. Therefore I figure the present day DNA Study and the macro recorded history are symbiotic. 

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