GENEALOGY-DNA-L Archives

Archiver > GENEALOGY-DNA > 2008-08 > 1217812551


From: (John Chandler)
Subject: Re: [DNA] What is the longest, mtDNA comfirmed, matrilineal line?
Date: Sun, 3 Aug 2008 21:15:51 -0400 (EDT)
References: <900328.85235.qm@web84305.mail.re1.yahoo.com>
In-Reply-To: <900328.85235.qm@web84305.mail.re1.yahoo.com> (message frommarianne dillow on Sun, 3 Aug 2008 11:55:54 -0700 (PDT))


Marianne wrote:
> I would like to ask a question on the Colonial--English DNA. Isn't
> part of the problem the English are hesitant in DNA testing and this
> is part of the problem.? I stand to be corrected if this isn't the
> total answer to the problem.

Most of the problem is simply that female lines are much harder to
trace than male lines. Two other small parts of the problem are that
mtDNA so much less information than Y-DNA and that European marriage
customs were mainly patrilocal. Note that the Colonial Sudbury line I
mentioned actually does "cross the pond". The emigration passenger
list shows John Bent, with his wife Martha and their children,
crossing on the _Confidence_ in 1638 to New England, and there are
lots of records pinning down the Bent family in Hampshire before that
emigration -- however, there is no record of the marriage of John and
Martha, and so Martha's maiden name remains unknown. We have no way
of knowing what parish she came from, and so it's not clear that an
mtDNA match somewhere in England would be a breakthrough in connecting
Martha to her antecedents, even if it were in Hampshire.

If it came down to a discovery of an English will menioning somebody's
daughter Martha Bent, plus a bunch of sisters who had female lines
traceable to the present day, I feel sure that the reluctance of the
traced descendants could be overcome.

John Chandler

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