53. Lost Lineage - In Far West Cork
(UPDATE - September 2023)
*There is now, more weight towards the Gosnells name, to the below story, as more & more people get tested. A lot of close related testers have come up in the past 2 years, since this was blog was written.
But it still has not given me a definitive surname, only an area to concentrate from.
Some really close testers are even from Australia, which has thrown me a bit of a curve ball on how we relate, but their trees cannot go back to this area or have only tested for a bit of fun & or not willing to participate in deeper research.
(Schull/Durrus/Ballydehob/Bantry is the most definitely the hotbed of the DNA testing area)*
About a year ago, I discovered some pretty interesting results on my Ancestry DNA kit.When the results came in, it showed a bit more detail than FTDNA.
Initially, I didn't understand how the matching system worked, so it took quite a bit of time to interpret the results as compared to FTDNA. It was around this time, I learned on how to use the "Shared Matches" tool.
Pretty soon, I was then able to place a bunch of interlinking matches, to form a grouping of people and then balance their matches and see how or they share a common area of living between 1700-1850. This is where I found, on how to get a better - more confident hypothesis, in to forming groups to their certain areas and how I relate to that group.
The method is not to relate to an individual DNA match as such and keeping them as an individual, but relate to an "Individual in group of matches and then place that group, to an area". This is key to unlocking the mystery.
This was so powerful, once I learnt how to identify a group, then to identify a place of that group and somewhat eliminate the or prove a lineage to that area. Part of this method was used below, to find a strong enough genetical story to Far West Cork, but it was not known who the exact ancestor was, but rather, a very good indication of the lineage. This is a complex story and as I am writing this, I believe now, there maybe more than 1 ancestor to this story.
So I picked up yet another story showing, that my genetics linked back to Far West Cork. I have been chasing this story for quite a long time.
The areas in particular, are to the Schull / Ballydehob and Skibbereen districts. A handful of matches were showing up with around 30cM's, with Irish ancestry and that were also themselves born in Ireland.
This grouping of DNA matches, could show Far West Cork in their Family Tree's and they kept intertwining with the same group of people.
I was kinda flabbergasted and excited all at the same time, to identify why DNA was picking this up. As I had no idea how I could be connected, or why I was being genetically matched to this group of people. There was no written or verbal family knowledge, to these areas, to form a hypothesis.
It took about 6 months to compile a hypothesis, that someone on my Father's lineages, had a very close-ish family member, that migrated to Australia and had very close ties with families in Far West Cork. The other quirky thing, was that it kept coming up with a French Huguenot flavour.
This is where I started to realise that there was no close name connection, to all of this.
With the amount of close matches and distanced matches, it was totally evident that I could put a place to this story, but no surname stoodout, to help define what lineage it was.
It also supported a thought, that could there have been a name change, due to the fact that DNA linked myself and my Father to a place in Ireland, during a certain time period, but couldn't identify a name. This frustrated me a little, because I could not line the DNA with a known family tree
However, what didn't make sense either, is that I kept running into very weird instances with the Gallagher/Sheehan and Minihane (+ it's variants - Moynihan/Minighan etc) names to this exact area.
These 3 names sit in my Family Tree, however none of my Cork families, matched the areas that the DNA was depicting.
So, then I decided to dig in to written historical references, to see if DNA and history said the same thing. I was trying to add weight to one side of that "see-saw" hypothesis, to help give a better interpretation.Even though DNA doesn't lie, I wanted to make sure, that History and DNA spoke the same language. It took a few months to find somewhat of evidence, that how history matched the names and grouping of DNA matches to my kit. It had a high probability of matching myself, on what was written about with Far West Cork history - to around the late 1600's and early 1700's. It also included some very strong references, to refugees from a political/religious point of view. These refugee's, were the French Huguenot's. However, I am also being open minded that there could have an intertwined German Palatinate story as well.
So, with this in mind, it was highly probable that this was my Paternal side of things, as nothing really matched my Mother. So, I hedged my bets and I asked my Father to help with my research, that is, to take an Ancestry DNA test. So, Ancestry test was done, submitted and the results are now in.
On a side note, My Father has done testing via FTDNA and after learning what I have, it shows the exact same story to Far West Cork. Though, I am finding it more difficult to user FTDNA's interface to determine groups of people, it takes almost twice the time than an Ancestry kit. After finding this story, I then used my FTDNA kit to see if that could elude to the same story. And it showed what I wanted to know, however the interpretation was much more difficult, as compared to Ancestry's matching system.
So, having been armed with a prior hypothesis with 2 FTDNA kits and 1 Ancestry kit, I put my Father's Ancestry Kit to the test. Could 1 generation closer to Ireland, bring us a better / stronger story.
The current answer is : Yes, it does show better detail to certain areas
The image below depicts the difference of 1 Generation. Of how an Ancestry kit defines it.
My Kit is on the left and my Father's on the right.
Notice the more defined groups of communities that are formed with my Father's kit.
However, South West Munster segment, did not break down to the Far West Cork community
So the current hypothesis to Far West Cork, is as follows :
- It is still not fully understood, which side of my Father's Parents, this story comes from. As some names link to his Maternal line and some of his Paternal line. I am being open minded as well, as that it could be both sides? Due to the fact of DNA telling a striking story to South Western Ireland.
- Names that link in with our genetics to Schull / Ballydehob or Skibbereen districts :Copithorne, Dukelow, Swanton, Young, Shannon, Wholehan (+ variants), Camier, Kingston, maybe Gosnell(s), maybe Woulfe (Wolf?) and a Lefevre
- Names that sit in my Family Tree, that may possibly intersect with this story :Sheehan, Ambrose, Godson, Bennett, Fitzgerald, Lynch, Casey, Lucey, Morgan, Collins, Minighan (+ variants), Gallagher.
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| DNA Match Area |
But the recent weeks of real deep research (and elimination), I believe now there maybe a link to the Godson or Ambrose name. Most possibly from my Male Fitzgerald immigrant's Mother - Catherine Godson or his even his wife - Elizabeth Ambrose.
The Godson name does seem to have a name change to a Godsell in what we know of, or that has been researched. However, the lineage goes from Cork back in time to Limerick and not 100% sure if it's correct. But we know 100%, Catherine was in the RC "South Parish" Church of Cork City, by 1807-1810.
The Ambrose name hasn't been placed to an area, other than Co. Cork.
Documentation shows Elizabeth Ambrose, married Thomas Fitzgerald in 1837, in the "Diocese of Cork & Ross". There has been no documentation found, to identify or support the actual parish where they got married, but it had to be of COI/Protestant nature, because Thomas and Elizabeth came to Australia in 1840 and were listed on the shipping document as Protestant.
So at the moment, I am deciding to side with the Godson name, due to the fact that a link to an actual DNA Gosnell's surname and connections via that name, is more compounding than any other hypothesis. This name, is the only piece of the puzzle that fits inline with the DNA matches to South West / Far West Cork.
