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DNA and Family Secrets


Yul Lose

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A relative of mine is really into ancestry and has been using a DNA service to search  the family histories. She did it on both sides of my family and discovered some very interesting Information about my ancestors that I was unaware of. Well she decided to do the ancestry search on her husbands side of the family and came across some information that the great grandfather on one side of the family had also been the father of one of his grandkids. I don’t know how all of the DNA stuff works but that’s what the DNA search uncovered. When my wife told me what the ancestry person had found I told her that that side of his family would get pretty upset if she broke the news to them because the great grandfather is kind of revered by the modern day family. Well I was right. They are pretty upset about it. So if you discovered something like this in the family tree would you let the rest of the family know or keep it buried?

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The easy answer is, "Is there a need to know?" If the information is necessary for someone to know for some purpose, then yes, regardless of how upsetting it is. If it is not necessary, but is instead in the realm of interesting trivia, then why risk upsetting others?

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4 minutes ago, DocWard said:

The easy answer is, "Is there a need to know?" If the information is necessary for someone to know for some purpose, then yes, regardless of how upsetting it is. If it is not necessary, but is instead in the realm of interesting trivia, then why risk upsetting others?

My thoughts too. I saw no upside revealing it.

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Too long ago and too many generations past to likely present a health risk, as long as it was a one off.

If it happened too often, for example like the Hapsburg dynasty, there would be deep concern.

 

 

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I don’t like secrets but I understand how others may prefer ignorance. If I had discovered information like that I would tell my family, “I have learned some things about our ancestors that I had never heard before, and it could be upsetting to some family members.  I will only share the information on request.”  Let others decide what they want to know.

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People always seem to believe the worst.

 

As I read that, Great Grandpa (generation 1 male) was the father of his "grandson" (generation 3 male).

 

So Great Grandpa has sex with his daughter in law. I don't see the health risk.

 

If generation 2 was a girl, well then Great Grandpa had sex with his daughter and that's not good.

 

But I can think of a couple of legitimate reasons for Great Grandpa having sex with his daughter in law.

 

Grandpa got run over by a truck, and Grandma wanted a boy child so that the name would continue, so she went to Great Grandpa and asked him if he would father a child with her.

 

Or in his mid-twenties Grandpa got the mumps. If you get the mumps as a kid your face gets lumpy, but if you get the mumps as an adult it can kill you, and if it doesn't it will most likely sterilize you.

 

So Grandpa caught the mumps, and is now shooting blanks. He and Grandma BOTH go to Great Grandpa and ask if he will impregnate Grandma so that the name will continue.

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22 minutes ago, Alpo said:

But I can think of a couple of legitimate reasons for Great Grandpa having sex with his daughter in law.

 

Or DIL was widowed or divorced... or she was real good looking... or it was hot and nothing better to do...

 

We can't start applying today's standards on events that happened well over a century ago.  

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1 hour ago, irish ike, SASS #43615 said:

I wouldn't put much trust on those DNA tests companies for ancestry. My mother in laws Grandmother was a full blooded Navajo. Making her some percentage native American of some sort. DNA test comes back nada!!!

 

Who'd you marry?  Elizabeth Warren?

 

LL

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Curiosity killed the cat.

 

I wouldn't go looking in the first place. But I can't think of any good reason to share such information if I had it. Just possibly sowing discord and unhappiness to no purpose. Of course, to some people, that is the purpose.

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What is the accuracy of these test? What are the chances that data gets mis-labeled?

 

As ALPO pointed out you now have a statement WITHOUT CONTEXT.  Times were tough, records were non-existent. and child services didn't exist. Parents died, neighbors took in their children and raised them as their own. People gave up babies because they couldn't care for them. Other people adopted them and raised them as their own. 

 

Men went to war, Women stayed home, people get lonely and in a moment of weakness stuff happens.

 

There are hundreds of possibilities and assuming the worst does the living no good.

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I pay Ancestry $200 every few months to do family research. I have found some interesting and very cool things about my Mom's  side of  the family. My Dad had a tendency to bad mouth my Mom's family while bragging up his own.

 

Turns out my  Dad's  family,  my relatives, were all a  bunch of slackers. No one served in the Civil War, WW1 or WW2 but to hear my Dad tell it they won the wars (By the way, my Dad was adopted but knew his birth family) My Dad was also 1/4 to 1/2 Cherokee (depending on how much liquor was in him or who was around) We have no American Indian blood. None, zero, zip, nada...NONE. But you can't tell my brother and sisters that.

 

My Mom's  side of  the family?

My Grandfather, Great Grandfather and my Great Great Grandfathers served in the Civil War (Union Army), WW1 and WW2. :FlagAm:

 

I wish my Mom and  Dad were alive so I could tell my Dad that, in front of my Mom, of course.

 

Regarding weird family secrets, I am paying the money for the information. No one else is. I  would not tell them.

 

I am truly hoping though that I am related to one Edward Burnworth of London who was put to death in 1726 for murder and a few other assorted lowlife things.

It  would truly explain a lot about my Dad's side of  the family. That is one tidbit I would happily  share with my family. :D

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44 minutes ago, Loophole LaRue, SASS #51438 said:

 

Who'd you marry?  Elizabeth Warren?

 

LL

Loophole ,

My Great Grand father was a pure blood Choctaw Indian.(He is the inspiration for my alias)

Several of my cousins have had DNA tests , none of which show any Choctaw blood.

After doing quite a bit of research,I've found that the ancestry databases are lacking data when concerning NativeAmercan lineage.Seems that they have more info on Central American Indians than they do North American Indians.

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The kind of things that happened before cable TV can be amazing.

 

Kind of goes to the idea -- 'Never ask a question you're not willing to hear the answer to.' Plenty of people Warrening their way through life on family legends and myths, then along comes 'AncestersBWe'uns', and they sign up 'cause the nice lady on the commercial found out she was related to the Queen of Sheba, but instead of royalty, they find out stuff they would rather keep on the back of the top shelf in the closet, behind the box with great-great-grandpa's Sunday teeth in it.

 

But when you pry the lid off the can and come up with these worms,you've got a pickle. If you don't tell, and someone else finds out (remember, the only time a secret is safe is if only one person knows it), you're a dog for not telling it. But if you tell it, there's likely to be someone who says you're a dog for sharing it.

 

Back to the original question -- it would depend on whether what generation that is directly involved is still around, and who the mother was. It is entirely possible that g-g-grandpa and g-g-grandma had a late in life child, and for whatever reason the child was raised by g-grandpa/g-grandma as their own. Yes, sometimes people raised their siblings as if they were their own children. In my own tree, g-g-grandpa was a twice-over widower, and had nine kids with three different wives. The age difference between his oldest son and his youngest son was twenty-five years. It would be entirely within reason that had something happened to g-g-grandpa, the youngest kids would have been raised by the older ones. But that's the kind of family lore that would likely have been known already.

 

But if the mother was one of his daughters or daughter-in-laws, I'd leave it right up there on the shelf, behind the teeth. If the old man was loved and respected, then I'd let the family keep their legends, and leave his sins for him and his Creator to sort out.

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Mormons are great on ancestry / genealogy.  I have family pedigree documentation going back generations.......and I don't care.  I know my mom's family were from the Vaudois Valleys (Waldens) in the Alps: Italian, Swiss, French and German....mostly Italian.  No royalty, no notable figures in the family until they came to these shores. Never put a cent in my pockets.

 

Dad's family re Scottish and English, with some Welsh, Irish, and Walloon mixed in.  the Taylors have our own tartan (ugly color combinations) and are sept to the Camerons and Stewarts.  One ancestor, Black Taylor of the Axe, was a noted warrior and was made a Laird.  None of this put and jingle in my jeans, either.  Some of the Taylors landed on this continent nine years after the Mayflower and settled in the Massannutten (Virginia) area, moved to Missouri, Kansas and other Confederate states and several served under the Stars and Bars.

 

Overall, I'm a proud pedigreed mutt and don't really care.  My family were good folks for the most part and I'm proud of who they were....and some still are.

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