Diana’s search

*All names have been changed

Search goal: Identify Diana’s paternal grandfather

Tyler, who I had assisted earlier this year, reached out for help a few months back for help with another family mystery. His relative, Diana, from his father’s adoptive family had done a DNA test, and it had revealed that her father had a different biological father than the rest of his siblings. Tyler had done some research already on her DNA matches but needed some help narrowing it down.

Diana’s paternal grandfather line matches were thankfully distinct even though her families were from a very endogamous province. The main two last names I was seeing in her matchlist were Ellison and Clinton. There were a few instances of various Ellisons marrying various Clintons I found right away as I was building the family trees of matches out, which made me think that some of Diana’s matches were going to be inflated a little due to double relationships or the general endogamy of the area.

After building out many of Diana’s paternal grandfather side matches, I found a family that I was pretty sure the biological father was from. The family included father John Ellison and his four sons. Two of the sons had grandchildren or great grandchildren that had tested and helped rule them out as possible fathers. But the two sons that were left were quite a bit younger than Diana’s grandmother- and with one being only 12 years older than Diana’s father, that didn’t seem likely either. We were puzzled for a little while.

While we worked on this case, Diana’s first cousin Kendra did a DNA test too, which revealed her mother’s father also had the same mystery father as Diana’s dad!

Kendra and Diana’s parents were not the oldest two children of their parents, or even the youngest two. They were in the middle of their sibling set. It was eventually established through additional family members testing that they were the only two that had a different parent, and it was the same man, indicating the affair had occurred for a few years and then ended for some reason.

Tyler and I started to notice that John Ellison had in fact died just a few months before Diana’s father was born. Death could certainly be a reason the affair ended.

Tyler worked on contacting some potential testers including Margaret, who was a daughter of the only remaining possible Ellison son of John. However, we now both thought it was less likely to be the son and much more likely to be John Ellison, the lonely widower who had suddenly died just before Diana’s dad was born.

Margaret agreed to do a DNA test and a few months later, the results were in. She was a perfect half first cousin match to Diana, and everyone was satisfied with the conclusion that John Ellison was the grandfather of Diana and her cousin Kendra as well. It was great to help solve another family mystery with Tyler for his extended family.