More DNA from Dunn and Dunlop Ancestors, Plus More?

Family Tree DNA notifies you when a "close" relative is found.  Based on whose account also received this email, I knew that the common ancestors would be in my father's Winterton/Dunn branch.

Family Tree DNA allows you to see the shared segments of DNA with anyone in your Family Finder results.  This person, who displayed his name, shares 13 segments of DNA totaling 323 centimorgans with my paternal grandfather's first cousin, D.W.  A check of the family tree showed the actual relationship between D.W. and this newly tested person as second cousins, once removed.  Their most recent common ancestors were Ezra Dunn (1821-1898) and Hermoin Dunlop (1827-1900) of New Jersey.  My line descends from their daughter, Catherine (1865-1944); the second cousin descends from another daughter, Violet (1873-1931).

Based on this view of the shared DNA, I can identify the mystery cousin from a year ago at 23andMe as a daughter or niece of this new match at Family Tree DNA.

Here are the problems:
1- This is a lot of DNA for second cousins to share.
2- The shared segment on chromosome 7 is shared by a fourth cousin from a different branch- Walling/Dey.

23andMe chromosome browser
Three segments of DNA shared by these fourth cousins, once removed.

Transcribed will of William Walling of Middleton, Monmouth County, New Jersey, 1823.
My line descends from the son William (1803-1870).
The fourth cousin whose DNA is featured above descends from the son Amos.

As I discussed back in 2015 when this Walling/Dey fourth cousin appeared, we need to triangulate these segments of DNA with other matches before we can decide if this is likely Walling/Dey DNA.  We cannot do this with this newly tested cousin because they are spread across companies.  The Walling/Dey cousin is on 23andMe and Ancestry.com (no chromosome browser), while this closer Dunn/Dunlop cousin is at Family Tree DNA.  If they both uploaded to GedMatch (for free!) we could see if they match each other on chromosome 7.  The next-generation cousin at 23andMe has not accepted my request to "share," so we cannot see the matching segments or compare to others.



The excessive DNA is caused by being related to this close Dunn/Dunlop cousin in one or more additional ways.  Possible explanations:

1-  One of his other ancestors not in the straight line of descent from Violet Dunn may be descended from our Walling/Dey branch.

2-  Ezra Dunn or Hermoin Dunlop may themselves have ancestors in common with William Walling and Rebecca Dey.  My inclination to locate this overlap (my first pedigree collapse!) would be in the ancestors of Margaret Combs (1795-1870), the mother of Hermoin Dunlop, because they were living in Monmouth County near Walling and Dey.  Hermoin's father, Joseph Dunlop (1797-1852), was possibly from Pennsylvania, while Ezra Dunn was in Trenton, New Jersey.  Go with a geographical match when trying to figure out these DNA connections.

Surviving Genes of Walling and Dey

I have figured out the most recent common ancestors of a DNA cousin.

A new Shared Ancestor Hint appeared for me at AncestryDNA.  This system compares the family trees of my DNA cousins, looking for the same ancestors from my family tree.

The shared ancestor suggestion was William Walling (1770-1824) of Monmouth County, New Jersey.  He is one of my 5X great grandfathers.  (His transcribed will can be found here.)  I don't know why his wife, Rebecca Dey (born about 1770), my 5X great grandmother, did not appear also.

Based on our family trees, this DNA cousin is a fifth cousin of my father.  AncestryDNA reports that I share some DNA with this fifth cousin.

Here is the step where a lot of people stumble:  this scenario does not prove that William Walling and Rebecca Dey are our biological ancestors; nor does it prove that the DNA we share is from William Walling and Rebecca Dey.

We need to see how much DNA and which segments of DNA are shared with this DNA cousin so that we can triangulate the match.  You cannot triangulate with AncestryDNA.

To triangulate, we need to look at other DNA cousins who match on these same shared segments of DNA and determine if they too trace ancestry back to William Walling and Rebecca Dey, or one of the ancestors of either of William Walling or Rebecca Dey.  With AncestryDNA, you have no information about where any of your other DNA cousins match you, so you cannot know if they match on the same segments as any other DNA cousins.

I remembered the name of this DNA cousin from 23andMe, where we had corresponded two years earlier.  We had discussed the idea that the common ancestors were not too far back in time and were likely in Monmouth County, New Jersey because this DNA cousin matched my father, his siblings, and their father's cousin from the Winterton/Dunn line in Monmouth County.  If this segment can be further identified as a Walling/Dey segment, then we know that the segment came to my father via William Winterton's mother, Sophia Walling.

We can see the shared DNA at 23andMe.

Note that one of the matches, a sibling of my father, shares a very tiny segment of only 5 cM.  Most people would disregard such a small amount, but as you can see in the graph, this small segment is in line with the larger segments shared by other close relations.

Prior exchanges with this DNA cousin at 23andMe did not lead to William Walling and Rebecca Dey because his family tree had not yet grown that many generations back.  Two years later, his family tree at Ancestry was more robust and prompted the discovery.

The next step is to look at the other DNA cousins who share this segment.  I maintain Excel spreadsheets for my closest relatives.

This snippet is from the spreadsheet of my first cousin, twice removed.  I list his DNA cousins by chromosome of where they share identical DNA.  The Walling/Dey cousin shares an identical segment on chromosome 7, starting around 91,000,000 and ending around 127,000,000.

I checked all of these smaller matches against the Walling/Dey cousin to see if they match him as well as my first cousin.  All of them do.  If this shared DNA is from the Walling/Dey couple, then all of these DNA cousins will also descend from Walling/Dey or from one of the ancestors of either William Walling or Rebecca Dey.

This is where you need to depend on others for information.  Some of these DNA cousins offer family tree information; most do not.  I reviewed their surname and location lists and family trees, if they had any, and saw nothing in common with Walling/Dey.  I sent them all a note, describing what we need to look for.

So far, nobody has replied.  Without finding a connection to Walling/Dey in these other matches, we cannot triangulate to declare that this segment of DNA is from Walling/Dey.

Death Knocked Twice

Some people's deaths were never reported to the State.  William Walling's death was reported twice.

William Walling was my 4x great grandfather.  He was born around 1803 in Keyport, Monmouth County, New Jersey to William Walling and Rebecca Dey.  He married Ellen Euphemia Imlay.  I descend from their daughter, Sophia T Walling.

William died in 1870 on July 31st.  A newspaper article four days before his death, described his physical labors constructing a building in Keyport.  I have been seeking documentation on his parents.

William Walling's death appears in the online index of New Jersey Deaths and Burials, 1720-1988 at FamilySearch.org (a free site).  But there seemed to be two entries: 1870 and 1871.  (Remember the past problem with this index:  the year can be off by one because New Jersey's records were not organized based on a calendar year.)

Volume AP is the death ledger for 1869-1870.
Volume AR is the death ledger for 1870-1871.

So I looked up both records.

Volume AP, New Jersey Deaths, Hunterdon-Warren Counties, 1869-1870

Volume AR, New Jersey Deaths, Hunterdon-Warren Counties, 1870-1871

Remember that individual death certificates were not issued until 1878.

Volume AP, page 118, covers deaths in Monmouth County, New Jersey from August 1, 1869 through July 31, 1870.  William Walling died on the last day covered by this ledger book.  Note that his parents are listed as Thomas and Rebecca.

Volume AR, page 111, covers deaths in Monmouth County from August 1, 1870 through September 30, 1871.  However, the first entry is a death on July 25, 1870 and the last is July 26, 1871.  William's parents are listed as William and Rebecca.

William died of stomach cancer in both entries.  Yet he was digging a well a few days before his death.

Also note that another Walling is on both pages.  Wallings are plentiful in the geographic area.

The research point is that a record may be missing completely, appear in duplicate, or appear in a place where it should not be.  So you need to cast a wide net of years and locations when looking for records.