How did we find the babyfather of my forebear (born 1846)?

Just how did we do that?

Recently, after centuries of silence, we heard from beyond the grave, from the bio-father of my Grandma's grandma, Ellen Bagshaw (1846-1901). Ellen has been dead a long time and was a tough cookie. There was some kind of encounter nine months prior to her birth, most likely off the market place in a town like Buxton in early Spring after a cold winter. The protagonists were foolish, fecklish and delirious youth of 23 and 20, intent on embarking on a bit of comfort in the sun, which the sands of time would forget. Something from a Hardy novel. Ellen herself was the antitheses of these qualities and devoted serious time to ensure her own family's future. We had never considered her biological father to be a real breathing person, but he was.

So, here is the news:

My DNA matches screamed Staffordshire, but I didn't have any Staffs ancestry? Piecing together trees of varied 20cM matches led me through new surnames to the Turnock family of Leek and thus an unknown burglar 3xgreat-grandfather (had fling in 1845- Derbyshire).

Let me say, there was no papertrail at all. This 'father' just vanished on arrival. DNA did resolve this, but I definitely could not have predicted this would happen, in advance. So, just how did we do that?

The wind was just 'in the right direction', and a number of factors lined up in making this possible. I am listing them here, and may revise this over time*, and after reflection:

1. We would have a surname of the babyfather that is very rare: there are 36 times as many "Mortons" around than these Turnocks, for example.
2. The quality of parish register and census data for the area where this group lived, North Staffordshire and southern Cheshire, was excellent, which combined with a rare surname made family tree reconstruction easy. 
3. We had chosen to test on Ancestry which has a very large database of testers and a very user-friendly interface. I also had a current Ancestry subscription which would help when it came to looking at the trees of matched people.
   
4. I knew the rest of the family tree very well, so as researcher I could eliminate lines that had nothing to do with it, and could also identify an 'alien' group of distant cousins as worthy of exploration.
   
5. I had no other known ancestry in Staffordshire: that would have muddied the waters considerably.
   
6. Ancestry was adamant that we had ancestry in the Potteries, Staffordshire. This meant that I had to take the information seriously. (I had been seeing Staffordshire-based people appear as matches for months and had ignored them.)
   
7. Close relatives of the 'babyfather' (his siblings) had 'umpteen' descendants; and unbeknownst to me, a large number of them had tested (at least 40 I'm thinking) of whom a high percentage shared portions of DNA with us (20 people and rising).
8. My relatives unwittingly 'favoured' this ancestor rather than other ancestors of the same generation - one does not inherit equal amounts of DNA from grandparents, still less from those in previous generations. (Reference to 'sticky' DNA removed.)
   
9. A member of an earlier generation had tested - and this increased the number and quality of matches by an order of magnitude. Without this, I may not have established a connection and the last point would not apply.
   
10. DNA matches themselves were largely co-operative and moderately chatty, enabling a few wrinkles to be smoothed or removed in the family tree.
11. I also had three days spare and some experience of this work already, which meant clues were not overlooked but rather exploited, pet theories were ruthlessly demolished and had trained myself to keep going even when there was no obvious path to success.
12. I had some experience of tracing families which meant those folks with blank trees, limited trees or wrong information could still be identified as part of the family. This was necessary as only 4 of our matches had the name Turnock in the tree.
    
13. I had access to a clustering tool which 'flagged up' groups of living cousins that were connected to each other by DNA. In fact, slowly working through this tool's output had me pause (for several weeks) as the 'flagged' group could no longer be ignored.
    
14. I was familiar with the concept of 'shared matches' with a reasonable grasp of probability, kinship terminology, genetic inheritance, the 'ThruLines' software.
15. And finally, a lone descendant of the 'babyfather' by a subsequent documented marriage was linked by papertrail to him, and had a demonstrably greater portion of shared DNA with us than anyone else from the line, meaning I could attribute parenthood to this gentleman rather than to any of his brothers/nephews.

*Light edit 2022.

Hillbilly Elegy

Having just read Hillbilly Elegy, by J. D. Vance, I was heartened to see that my Middletown, Ohio, cousin, Lily was connected through the arteries to the same people, Vance writes on. Lily’s daughter married a man from Jackson, Breathitt County, Kentucky where ‘a women ain’t fully dressed without her gun’. I’m proud of that connection. Times ahead would prove tough and forty years down the track they had one heck of a fight on their hands to keep the family together. Lily sent my great-grandparents in Wales blankets during the War. They were good people.

The Charwoman at the Poorhouse

Jenny Jory was born 1789 the 'baseborn' child of Jane Jory (then 25). I had thought that Jane was my forebear, but it turns out mine is two years younger and from Truro, 5 miles away.

The problem seems to have been the London Road just a ten minute walk away. All her children were born out of wedlock, and it seems by different fathers.

1. James 1808 (dies age 11)
   
2. Lissey Brown Jory 1813, father John Brown, farmer, Ninnis
   
3. Mary Perry Jory 1816, father George Perry, farm labourer, Bodmyn Prison (dies age 33)
   
4. James 1819, father Richard Lanyon, farmer Lamsear (dies age 26)
   
5. Simon 1825, father William Bartis, labourer of uncertain location (dies age 15)
   
6. John 1828, father John Cock, farm labourer, Churchtown in the parish

In most of these Jenny is described as charwoman, Butts Poorhouse or charwoman of Killivose

John Brown is worse as two months later his other illegitimate is born of Elizabeth Roberts, another charwoman in the parish (at Downs Tenement), who has illegitimate twins by him three years later (1816) by which time he is in 'Bodmyn Prison'. Elizabeth too has other illegitimate children (also with several children are two other charwomen, Honor Keast and Ann Batten).

The parish does a good job of naming the fathers. John Jory the youngest child becomes a farm servant and moves away.

Jane dies age 80 at Mile Stone House (or Hendra) in the parish, 1870. She lived for the last years with her son John who was a lead miner.

Four Gone: A Disappearing Act

I have several people on the family tree for whom there exists just a birth or baptismal record, and nothing else. Yet the most puzzling disappearants, are a group of four. Outside of wartime, you don't expect to lose sight of a whole group: there ought to be a trace somewhere. The cast of four are:

1) Edward Pascoe, who signed his name Pasco. Occupation unknown, son of a butcher. Age unknown. All that is known is he married Mary in 1839 at Golant St Sampsons Church.

2) Mary Pascoe, born Mary Hitchens in 1806 at Gwennap. She had first been married to William Hawkings who was a blacksmith and later a schoolmaster, living in the parish of Tywardreath. I can at least divine that he had an accident, occasioning the change of occupation and likely leading to his premature death. Two friends, perhaps, assist the widow claiming his funds.

Now for the final pair of our party, Edward's two stepdaughters by Mary's first marriage:

3) Elizabeth Hawkings, baptised 1831 at Tywardreath.

4) Ann Hawkings, baptised 1833 at Tywardreath.

The next event we have is the marriage in 1839 and there is no sighting in Cornwall for them in census of 1841. Vanished!

Where could they have gone?

The story is intrigued by the Will of Mary's sister, Ann Hendra (nee Hitchens), dated 1877, some years later. She singles out her two nieces that had the name 'Ann' including Ann Hawkings. Baptised as Ann Hendra Hawkings, she is listed in the Will as Ann H_______ Hocking. Now I have no way of knowing if this is a true transcription, which I'm reading on the 'enrolled copy'. I suspect it isn't as the testator should have known the Ann H_______, as it was her own name! This casts doubt on the 'Hocking' too. Had Ann married, or is this a misreading of Hawkings? The aunt doesn't bother putting the married name of the other niece (Sarah Ann Verran) suggesting she might either not know or care about such details. One of Mary's sisters is named, despite being in Australia (this fact of course not being provided) suggesting that Mary was likely dead prior to 1877.

I have combed records. I have eliminated "Ann Hendra Uren" in Michigan. I have consulted obvious indexes. I looked in Avoca (where two Hawkings relatives lived), the Clare Valley (ditto the Verrans) and Whitby Ontario (ditto more Hawkings relatives). (I may have missed a shipping record). These folks are eluding me.

I glanced through 200 baptisms and 250+ marriages to home in on "John Pascoe the butcher", father of Edward, but he is not becoming apparent.

I wonder a bit about South America. If that was their destination, it will be a hard ride through the records to find them.

I hope to consult the Estate Duty returns for the aunt's estate: massive volumes inaccessible at the National Archives.

It would certainly be a feather in my cap to locate these folks: but it will be a waiting game thanks to this Disappearing Act.