Rebecca's Land

Have you ever found you have attributed a record to the wrong person? Unfortunately, with same name research that can happen too easily.

As I was transcribing deeds that I thought were for James and Rebecca (Anderson) Crawford of Garrard County, Kentucky, I began to question whether these deeds were for this James and Rebecca (Anderson) Crawford.

There were some clues in the deeds that should have led me to a different James Crawford.

The first clue was the signatures. Rebecca's name was above James'.

Garrard County Tax

Have you ever tried to figure out who is who in a community when there are multiple people of the same name?

Well, that's where I am with the Garrard County tax records from 1797-1806.

I have four Crawford families that potentially live in Garrard County during that time period.

• James Crawford husband of Rebecca Anderson who purchased land from Thomas Kennedy. James' sons were Isaac (?-?), William (1784-1864) and James (1790-1856)
• William Crawford who claimed to have purchased land from J Kennedy. His sons would not have been old enough to be listed on the tax lists while William Crawford was living in Garrard County. 
• James Crawford who married Martha Knight in 1793 in Lincoln County, Kentucky. James is thought to be the son of Rebecca Crawford. Rebecca purchased land from George Douglas.
• James Crawford who married Sally Duggins in 1799 in Garrard County, Kentucky. James is thought to be the son of Mary Crawford who married Alexander Moore.

Revelation

Have you ever tripped over a county line? I mean, have you ever not considered a family in the neighboring county just because they are in the neighboring county?

Well, I have -- for over thirty years.

As I've written about before, I have two James Crawford families living in Preble County, Ohio. One is my ancestor and one is his neighbor.

• James Crawford of Preble County, Ohio

My ancestor was married in Garrard County, Kentucky in 1799, while the other James was married in Lincoln County, Kentucky in 1793. For all these years, I've thought that the records for Lincoln County, Kentucky were in relation to the 'other' James while the records in Garrard and Madison counties were for my James.

Unexcpected DNA Finding

Last week, I watched the "Watch Geoff Live: DNA" webinar on Legacy Family TreeWebinars. While watching, I followed along by looking at my autosomal DNA results on Ancestry. I had my DNA tested last summer and had studied some of the results but hadn't found the help with 'brick walls' that I had hoped for.

One of the brick walls I've been working on is my James Crawford line. My James Crawford died in Preble County Ohio in 1854. He married Sally Duggins in Garrard County Kentucky in 1799. Sally had previously been married to Alexander Duggins by whom she had two sons: William and Henry. Henry Duggins was married to Jane Sellers, daughter of Nathan Sellers. Nathan A. Sellers was a neighbor of my James Crawford and died in Preble County Ohio in 1824. In early Preble County Ohio, there was a second James Crawford who owned land adjoining my James Crawford. This James Crawford married Martha Knight in 1793 in Lincoln County Kentucky. It is believed that two of the sisters of this James Crawford married brothers to Nathan A. Sellers. Thus, the two Crawfords, the Sellers and the Duggins were all neighbors in Preble County Ohio and loosely related by marriages. However, no proof has been found of any relationship between the two James Crawfords.

As I was watching and following along, I somehow searched my DNA results for the Sellers surname. SURPRISINGLY, I found matches on Nathan Sellers of Pennsylvania! I've found at least two others (enough for a circle of 3) but the generations don't quite match up for Ancestry to create a circle (yet). Thus, I've started trying to document a circle.

A known descendant of James and Martha has his DNA on Gedmatch (but not on Ancestry). When we have compared our two sets of DNA, it said there were 'No Shared DNA segments found'. Thus, we assumed we either weren't related or that it was far enough back that the DNA didn't help.

With my new SELLERS discovery, I decided to re-look at Gedmatch. This time, I had it show the chromosomes. We still didn't have matches on 'centromeres'. However, the chromosomes weren't all red. Thus, I had to study the GedMatch key.

According to the key, the more lime green, the more matches on base pairs (A-T and C-G). When I looked at the chromosome comparison with the descendant of the other James Crawford, I found that we had a lot of yellow and green on chromosomes 21 and 22.

 When I did the same comparison between the descendant of James and Martha Crawford and a descendant of Nathan A. Sellers, there was even more yellow and green on these two chromosomes.

Granted, all results still say 'No shared DNA segments'. However, this is comparing autosomal DNA and not yDNA. I'm also looking at possible relationships at least six generations back. This yellow and green and the fact that SELLERS turns up as a surname match on Ancestry is enough to cause me to re-look at the research I have already done and use the SELLERS research to learn more about my CRAWFORD lineage.