Scotch-Irish-L Archives
Archiver > Scotch-Irish > 2010-03 > 1268087539
From: "Cliff. Johnston" <>
Subject: Re: [S-I] Mitchell, Scotch/Irish New York to Michigan
Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 16:32:23 -0600
References: <1518007305.15237671268086282236.JavaMail.root@sz0165a.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net>
Linda,
You beat me to the punch :-) Yes, it is impossible to tell via Y-DNA
testing how much scotch or irish one has in oneself unless it came in a
bottle ;-)
By the way, FWIW, my wife's family are Casey - staunch R.C.. Don't ask how
I survived as a Presbyterian at their gatherings, but we love each other :-)
...lol... They all claim to have an unbroken line of Irish R.C.s going back
to Saint Paddy himself... Last month I posted some of their family
information on the Co. Cork site and had FTDNA send my brother-in-law a
Y-DNA test kit. I also checked with FTDNAs Casey group. Much to my surprise
guess what I found!!! The Casey lines there trace their ancestry back to
Scotland and Protestants. Now that was a shocking suprise and a half.
Needless to say my wife's Casey family has not commented on that...yet...
;-)
Cliff. Johnston
"May the best you've ever seen,
Be the worst you'll ever see;"
from A Scots Toast by Allan Ramsay
----- Original Message -----
From: <>
To: <>
Sent: Monday, March 08, 2010 4:11 PM
Subject: Re: [S-I] Mitchell, Scotch/Irish New York to Michigan
> Hi Richard,
>
> This doesn't quite make sense to me:
>>My FTDNA, (67 Y Markers Tested), shows overwhelming Scotch and Irish
>>ancestry with Irish being slightly higher than Scotch.
>
> Thats not how Y DNA results are reported (in any useful fashion). Are you
> refering to the familytreedna page of Recent Ancestral Origins? That's not
> accurate at all. It just sees where people that match you (who have
> origins) come from. A lot don't list origins and some are wrong.
>
> Go with your haplogroup. The haplogroup is of course fuzzy too for a
> couple reasons: We don't know where they originated (though the scientists
> have theories -- which change every two years) and who cares -- we want to
> know where your immediate ancestors were living. If you turn up NW Irish,
> you can assume they were in Ulster or nearby areas of Scotland -- ie it
> gives you some clues.
>
> What's the haplogroup? And who do you match to? You may find matches with
> a different
> surname because surnames are fairly recent, but they're a clue. If you
> tell us a few of
> them, maybe we can tell from the surnames where they might have come from,
> unless it was
> Glasgow....same surnames in parts of Glasgow as in northern Ireland
> because so many
> went over.
>
> The point is though that these are statistical and your unique history is
> unique and not based on statistics. You use the statistics to figure out
> where the best places are to search.
>
> You don't have enough info to search in Scotland. You need to follow
> George back through the censuses as far as you can. You might find him
> living as a child in a household with his parents. Anyway the census work
> will give you an approximate date of birth. Then censuses also tell you
> where he was born -- what state. You should also try to find an obit for
> him and see if you can view the actual death record, not a death
> certificate. This is dependent on the state he died in. What state did he
> die in?
>
> You also need to gather all his siblings, their dates of birth and where
> they were born
> from the censuses. These are clues, esp. ones born in Scotland. There are
> plenty of James Mitchells there, but with the names of children and maybe
> spouse, you can narrow it down. Since he was born in the USA and his
> father in Scotland probably his father was in the USA at the time of his
> birth and you can trace him backwards in the censuses. Then you look for a
> naturalization record. If he was in the USA in 1812, if he was not
> naturalized he should be listed as an alien. the book is in Ancestry. You
> want to search for a naturalization record for the father and then first
> papers. The first papers are more likely to nail down his origins. However
> the people who stood for him are critical people. Like in the case of a
> client of mine whose ancstors claimed to be Scots, the men who stood for
> him when he naturalized were both first generation Irish. They didn't
> randomly go somewhere in the USA -- they went to where other people from
> the family and/or village went. It's called c!
> hain migration. So you always look up those guys in the censuses and see
> what you can learn about them. They are clues.
>
> Similarly, one of the sons of the Rev. John Black, who also became a
> minister, witnessed the
> will of a Kelly ancestor of mine. Why? He died north of the Allegheny and
> this man's church
> was in Wilkinsburg. Because of some previous tie, that's why. There were
> Kellys associated
> with the Reformed Presbyterian church in Wilkinsburg but so far I've not
> found the origins
> of mine -- but it is an important clue to where they were before they
> manifested in Indiana
> Twp (Allegheny Co).
>
>>I apologise to any of those who I may have offended on the list,
>
> Actually I did more offending than you today. You didn't offend anyone at
> all.
>
> Good luck!
>
> Linda Merle
>
>
>
>
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