I received my Mtdna from my mother, who received it from her mother, and on back to the beginning lost in the mists of time. The Mtdna we all share is L3e3b. We share this haplo group with the Mende people of Sierra Leone. You can read more in this post Stolen from Africa – Fearless Females.
Annie Williams is the first woman of this ancestral line that I can name. She was born about 1820 in Virginia. Unfortunately, I do not have a photograph of her. Her daughter Eliza Williams Allen (The Eliza I named this blog for.), and all of her children were born in Alabama. Eliza passed her Mtdna to her 13 children, including my great grandmother, Jennie Virginia Allen Turner. Jennie passed it on to my grandmother, Fannie Mae Turner Graham. Fannie passed it on to my mother, Doris Graham Cleage. My mother Doris passed it on to me and I passed it on to my children. My daughters have passed it to their daughters. My sons’ daughters received their own mother’s Mtdna. You can read about all of my past and present, extended family members who received Annie Williams L3e3b Mtdna in this post from 2013 – Seven Generations of L3e3b
Click images to enlarge.
I never realized you look so much like Ms. Eliza! Remarkable post & documentation Kris. You do your family so proud!:)
Do you think so? I probably look like any of my ancestors at the time I appear near them in a photograph. A bit from here, a tad from there. Thanks Luckie.
I’m not going to pretend I understand the technical aspects of this post, but it’s so cool that you can trace lineages so reliably and find connections this way, and amazed you keep finding new and interesting tidbits.
I have a friend who’s wife’s grandfather was trying to use similar technology to prove his relation to King Louis XVII – there’s debate over the validity of previous DNA tests. Very compelling stuff.
The MtDna is just a small part of the whole shebang. The rest is combined and mixed from all my direct ancestors. The Mtdna though, goes from mother to daughter (like I said above) and so you can trace back through the generations to where that stream of women came from.
Being a man, you have both your mother’s Mtdna and your father’s Ydna. Unfortunately girls don’t get that Y chromosome from our father’s, so I cannot trace that stream. And, even worse, my father and his brothers and his father’s brothers did not leave any male children so I cannot trace that line. In fact, neither did my mother’s father or his brother’s leave any male heirs so we do not know where those particular streams of dna came from.
Here is a link to other posts I wrote about my dna, giving more of the whole picture. http://findingeliza.com/archives/15736
WooHoo! I love it. The photos bring the Haplogroup together and the similarities and how it goes back and forth in time. I loved how you pieced that together. My U5b’s need a revamp after this. Loved it Kris!
I look forward to seeing your revamp 🙂
I love how you arranged photos in this post. I like being able to see how the different family traits were passed down each generation. Proud to share L3e3b in common with you. As always another wonderful post!
Maybe our foremothers knew each other thousands of years ago.
I can see a little of Miss Eliza in your granddaughters. That Mtdna is some strong stuff in the genes. Beautiful photos.
What a wonderful record! Beautiful photos, too.
Hi Kristin – what an amazing record you’ve been able to trace and store for future generations … fascinating. The family must be so pleased to have these records … such a pity about the male lines … but something is better than nothing. Well done is all I can say.
Last year in March – I wrote 4 long posts (warning!) about how the scientists had traced DNA back into Africa using people’s DNA today … and the fact that one of the people is almost certainly descended from the Neanderthals …
So I can understand your significant DNA genetic markers … fascinating to have been able to do this …
I’m way behind in my catch up for comments on my A-Z postings …
Cheers Hilary
I do have a bit of neanderthal too 😀