ISOGG Newsletter July 2009

Vol. 2 No. 7 Jul 2009

From the Director - Successful Surname Searching
     One of the many challenges of using Y-chromosome DNA for locating others with your surname is locating them in the first place.
     If you have a rare or unusual surname, this can have its advantages and disadvantages. The disadvantage is obvious; it could be difficult to locate males with this surname. But the advantages can be tremendous in that you could have a broader range of tools available to you with which to locate people. For example, you could set up a Google alert or Ebay alert on the surname. A member of the Guild of One Name Studies had quite a success story by doing this. She set up a search for the rather rare surname, HUDGILL and received a hit on Ebay. The item posted on Ebay turned out to be one of her great-grandfather's British victory medals from WWI. To top it off, there are only 7 people with the HUDGILL surname in the United Kingdom where she lives and her great-grandfather's medal turned up in California! If she had not had the alert set up, she never would have known about it.
     In addition to entering alerts into Google and E-bay, many genetic genealogists are meeting with success by setting up surname groups on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook. DNA Project Administrator, Debbie Kennett shared that, "Twitter is also potentially a useful tool for recruiting participants to your DNA project. I experimented by following some of the CRUSES on Twitter. Most of them then responded by following me. One lady sent me a direct message and told me to get in touch with her 79-year-old father who has been researching his family history and is in the process of writing up his memoirs. As a result he is now the latest recruit to my DNA project! His line would have been very difficult to track down via conventional genealogy resources."
     However, a word of caution when 'friend requesting' people on Facebook: do not add too many people at one time. Spread those contacts out few and far between. Facebook has a reputation for revoking accounts of people whom they feel are spammers by virtue of too many friend requests. I know of DNA Project Admins this has happened to. One had his account restored and the other did not. A new social networking site debuted this month just for genealogists: GenealogyWise. GenealogyWise is sponsoring a contest which ends August 6 including "$100 to the owner of the surname group with the most members". This is where having a common surname can be beneficial! NOTE: The contest has now been modified to "$100 for the member with the highest quality surname group" so it is open game for all surnames now.
     As more and more social networking sites are launched, it continues to increase the value of the internet as the most powerful and affordable tool for successful surname searching!

-Katherine Borges
ISOGG Director

BBC's "The Incredible Human Journey" is now available on YouTube!
As mentioned in our May ISOGG newsletter, the British television series,
"The Incredible Human Journey" is now available for viewing on YouTube:

Episode 1 Out of Africa

Episode 2 Asia

Episode 3 Europe

Episode 4 Australia

Episode 5 The Americas

For more DNA videos:
http://www.isogg.org/dnavideos.htm

DNA Testing Confirms Earliest Known Genealogy from the Bahamas
by Peter J. Roberts

     The Bahamian Alburys are believed to descend from Henry Albery of Locks Farm, near Wokingham, Berkshire, England. Henry died when his sons were relatively young and left instructions for his property to be sold and the proceeds divided among his heirs. His son, William Alburie, age 15 embarked from London on 30 September 1635 on the ship Dorset, bound for Bermuda. His brother John sailed to Rhode Island and is believed to be ancestor of the Albro family. In 1650 Capt. William Alburie/Albury sailed from Bermuda to Harbour Island, Bahamas on the yacht, Gertrude. In 1699, the Spanish attacked Nassau and killed several of it's
inhabitants (including William's likely son Joseph). Joseph's children, John Albree/Albury (b. 1688) and his sister Elizabeth (b. 1691), were made orphans by this event. They were taken in by the captain of a Boston vessel who brought them to Boston early in the year 1700. In May 1711, John married Elizabeth Green of Boston and they are the ancestors of the Albree family of New England.
     Albury is a common surname in the Bahamas, so it appears that Joseph (d. 1699) had a brother who survived Spanish attack. That brother is the ancestor of the Albury family in the Bahamas today. However the earliest any of them are able to trace their Albury ancestry on paper is to a William Albury b. 1780 Harbour Island.
     Y chromosome results reveal that a gggggg-grandson of Joseph Albree/Albury d. 1699 New Providence shares Albury ancestry with a direct paternal line descendant of William Albury (b. abt 1780 of Harbour Island, m. Elizabeth). They both match 23 out of 25 markers on Y chromosome tests and have no other close matches in the FamilyTreeDNA customer database. Y chromosome results for descendants of John Albro of Rhode Island have also confirmed his haplotype (which belongs to a different haplogroup) and they don’t share direct paternal line ancestry with the Albree/Albury family.

For more DNA success stories or to submit yours, visit:
http://www.isogg.org/successstories.htm

DNA in the News

Youths plunge into serious study of DNA at advanced UA laboratory
- Arizona Daily Star - 7 Jul 2009
Analysis Of Copernicus Putative Remains Support Identity
- Science Daily - 7 Jul 2009
Can DNA tests help your genealogical inquiries?
- Citizen-Times.com - 6 Jul 2009
Exhumation of 1812 war hero stirs controversy
- Canada.com - 2 Jul 2009
Ancient DNA Analysis Reveals Family Ties in Ruins of Pompeii
- The Spittoon - 1 Jul 2009
Among Many Peoples, Little Genomic Variety
- Washington Post - 22 Jun 2009

For more articles:
http://www.isogg.org/newsarchives.htm

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