Tag: Lineage

January 14, 2018 Dennis Ayers

As with earlier depictions of ancestor lineages, I have used a timeline chart below, to show the life spans of each Jackson ancestor over the last three centuries. In the chart you can see Mathew Jackson, the last of the line who lived in England. He is followed in sequence by his son, William Jackson Sr, who was our immigrant ancestor to America arriving in the Virginia colony around 1679, and then by his son, John Ellis Jackson, and so forth.

 

As with previous lineages, to give a better perspective of when our Jackson ancestors lived across more than three centuries, I’ve added major wars to the timeline. As I continue to describe family stories of this Jackson lineage, you might find it useful to refer back to this chart to get a feel for the time period in which they lived.

 

Click for a Larger View

December 26, 2011 Dennis Ayers No comments exist

It has been suggested by a number of researchers that the Derryberry family living in North Carolina by 1778 were descendants of Michael Dürrenberger who may have come by way of Virginia. There is also a possibility that they might have descended from Dürrenbergers who came directly from Alsace or Switzerland to the Carolinas by way of Charleston. There is no direct evidence to support which of these theories is correct.  What is definitely known, however, is that DNA evidence now exists that proves the Derryberry line originated from the Alsatian/Swiss Dürrenbergers regardless of how they arrived in North Carolina.

 

After they first appear in North Carolina, it is difficult at best to determine which of the earliest Derryberrys are descended from whom. Records are scarce and the repetition of so many given names makes it necessary to use as much circumstantial evidence as possible to reconstruct relationships up through about 1850. However, thanks to the diligent work of other researchers like Don Cross and Bob Derryberry, a most likely set of family relationships has evolved and this is what I show on the Ayers-Derrie Family Tree website, and what forms the basis for the early years on the Derrie lineage shown below.

 

As with our Ayers lineage, I have used a timeline chart to show the life spans of each Derrie ancestor over the last three centuries.  In the chart, you can see the New Jersey ancestors in green on the left side, and then the North Carolina and beyond ancestors on the right side in blue.  I show a dotted line between Michael Dürrenberger of New Jersey and John Derryberry of North Carolina to indicate there are no actual records to tie them together, only DNA test results.

 

                                      Derrie Lineage Timeline — Click for a larger view

 

Again to give a better perspective of when they lived across the three centuries, I’ve added major historical events.  As I continue to describe family stories of this lineage, you might find it useful to refer back to this chart to get a feel for the time period in which they lived.

 

March 28, 2011 Dennis Ayers No comments exist

As it became clear that the Northern Ayers Line connects to the Southern Ayers Line, it also became possible to string together our entire Ayers lineage in North America.  To do this, I used a timeline chart to show the life spans of each ancestor over the last four centuries.  In the chart shown below, you can see the New England and New Jersey ancestors in Green on the left side, and then the Southern Ayers ancestors in blue on the right side.

Ayers Lineage Timeline — Click to get a larger view

The Southern Line starts with Nathaniel Ayers and I’ll be discussing him in my next post.  Note that I’m still showing a dotted line between John Ayers of New Jersey and Nathaniel Ayers to indicate there are no actual records to tie them together, only DNA test results.  The numbers next to each name indicate the generation back from myself shown at the very bottom.

 

To give a better perspective of time across the four centuries, I’ve added notations on the chart indicating when some major events or wars occurred.  From now on as I talk about each ancestor in the Southern line, you might want to refer back this chart to get a feel for the time period in which each lived.

March 26, 2011 Dennis 1 comment

As I mentioned back in my first post about our ancient ancestors from Europe, in 2009 I had a Y-Chromosome DNA test done to determine my genetic profile. The main purpose for this test was to solve a seemingly insurmountable problem about our Ayers lineage in North America. This mystery had become a brick wall in genealogy terms.

 

Our ancestors in New England and New Jersey whom I have already discussed, I call “The Northern Ayers Line”. The ancestors that I will be discussing in future posts are who I call “The Southern Ayers Line”.  The Migration Map below clearly shows the geographic separation of the two lines.  Although I, and other researchers as I later found out, strongly believed that the two lines were related due to circumstantial evidence, no official connection could be made due to the lack of actual records.

 

Incomplete Migration Map

 

Getting serious about solving the mystery, in the Fall of 2009, I joined a group of other Ayers folks around the country who also had DNA test results to compare.  As it turns out, most of the others had results that showed they belonged to haplogroups other than R1b.  This means those “Ayers” came from entirely different bloodlines, perhaps originating in Scotland, Germany or elsewhere.  However, there were a few other R1b’s like myself, and as time went on still more testers joined the group raising hope of a successful outcome.

 

Recall that Y-Chromosome genetic markers are passed from father to son down the line.  Without getting into the boring details, the basic approach is to compare Y-Chromosome markers with someone else to see how many matches you have. This allows you then to determine about how many generations back you had what’s called a Most Recent Common Ancestor or MRCA.  Then by comparing lineage charts you can typically pinpoint and name the MRCA.

 

After about a year, enough other R1b folks had joined our group so that we could definitively trace many relationships.  Finally by the Fall of 2010, several other testers and I were actually able to trace our MRCA all the way back to John AYRE, who came over from England.  This means that paper trail or not, my bloodline and thus our Southern Ayers line does in fact flow from the Northern Ayers line. By using DNA to solve the mystery, I had jumped over my brick wall!  See the now complete Migration Map below.

 

Complete Migration Map
Complete Migration Map

 

Note that the early migrations had to have been by ship since before about 1725, there were essentially no overland trails to be safely followed.