Volume 2, Issue 3 March 2011 WEBB SURNAME DNA PROJECT THE WEBB BULLETIN NEWS, PROJECT UPDATES & RECORDS I N T H I S I S S U E : The Non-Paternity Event The Non-Paternity Event 1 Definition: “Non­paternity event [NPE] is a From the Administrator 1 term in genetic genealogy and clinical genetics to describe the case where the biological father WEBB Records Repository of a child is someone other than who it is - Alabama 4 presumed to be.” – Wikipedia.com - Arizona 5 Also known as non-paternal event, false paternal - Canada West 6 event, false paternity and misattributed paternity, - Iowa 7 and depending upon the source, the rate of occurrence is somewhere between 1.5 and 5%. - Kansas 8 There seems to be some consensus that the rate - Massachusetts 12 is about 4%, and using that figure, over a span of - New Mexico 20 10 generations [25 years per generation], the percentage rate of occurrence is about 33.5%. - North Carolina 21 That is a pretty high probability of occurrence in a two hundred and fifty year timeframe. It would be a mistake if we were to believe that most non-paternity events were due to what some call “the milk-man” effect or infidelity. This could account for a significant portion of the events, but there are many other reasons that these incidents occurred. Continued on page 2 From the Administrator Dear Project Members, To those members who have taken the Family Finder test and have signed up for the conversion [before February 16th], you should be receiving your results on or before April 15th. Many of them have already come in. To the few of you who didn’t sign up, your results will be automatically converted to the new platform after the others are completed. FTDNA is changing over to the Illumina Omni platform because it “offers better potential for future upgrade options.” There are some rumors floating around about what those upgrade options might be, but nothing substantiated yet, so I will have my ear to the ground, and as soon I learn what those new options will include I will let everyone know. I would like to thank Kathy McHale for her hard work and generosity by providing us with her compilation of the Essex Co. MA Probate Records Index found in this issue. She did a tremendous job, and I am very grateful to her for donating her time and research talent to help the project. Eileen Eileen THE WEBB BULLETIN Page 2 The Non-Paternity Event [cont.] T hey include: Informal or formal adoption by a stranger Child assimilated into another family due to death of his own parent or parents Grandparents raising an illegitimate grandchild as their own Uncle or Aunt raising his or her sister’s children as his/her own Name change as an adult [for various reasons] A child known by mother’s maiden name A child known by stepfather’s name Aliases [for all kinds of reasons] Man takes wife’s name All kinds of situations arose Man marries pregnant widow and families came up with a Man marries unmarried pregnant woman myriad of solutions, and we Pregnancy outside of marriage may have a hard time Informal adoptions were very common before courts became involved in this detecting what they were.” process. Often a sister would take her siblings children if there were a death or misfortune in the family. Epidemics were not uncommon and they could leave children without both parents. Wars and economic situations often split families and created situations where children were forced to leave their birth families to be raised as someone else’s children. Stepchildren very often took their stepfather’s name. Grandparents would frequently raise a grandchild born out of wedlock as their own child. Social pressures to hide illegitimate pregnancies dictated the frequency of covering up these occurrences. Perhaps a girl would get pregnant out of wedlock and “seamlessly” marry someone other than the father who then raised the child as his own. Instances of friends and neighbors raising one or more child from another family was not uncommon. All kinds of situations arose and families came up with a myriad of solutions, and we may have a hard time detecting what they were. In many cases, DNA testing can give us the ability to know that an NPE has occurred in our line, particularly when the DNA has been broken more recently. It is easier to detect because lo and behold, we seem to match [with frequency] people with another surname rather than our own. Then the challenge becomes why, when and by whom. If your “given surname” doesn’t match your “DNA surname” the following are some ways to try to determine where the NPE occurred: 1. Search census records for people with your “DNA surname” who lived near your family. Be certain you check all generations and all places that your family lived. When censuses are not available, use tax lists, land records and court records. 2. If your “DNA surname” matches the surname of someone who was known to have married into your family, check their household[s] for children’s names, deaths of spouses, etc. Sometimes you can find your ancestor in his original household at a younger age, and with his original surname. The same goes for neighbors or friends of your family with your “DNA surname.” 3. Check your ancestor’s household[s] and look closely at the age of your ancestor vs. the age of the mother in the household. If she seems too old to be the mother of your ancestor, she may have been a grandmother raising her daughter’s child [or someone else’s] as her own. 4. Examine closely the ages and birth dates of your ancestor’s children. You may be able to pick up an overlap of the ages of your ancestor and one of his “siblings.” THE WEBB BULLETIN Page 3 5. Try to determine through marriage bonds and records, and/or careful examination of early census records, whether your ancestor may have had more than one marriage and may have become the stepfather of his wife’s children. One of these could end up being your ancestor. 6. Look at parish records and check the marriage date of your ancestor against the date of the birth of the couple’s first child. 7. Study Wills for clues that might show favor of one child over the other or spell out relationships. Sometimes the Wills of uncles, aunts, grandparents or siblings are more likely to reveal an NPE than the father or mother’s Will. One shouldn’t automatically 8. Check birth and death certificates to try and rule in or out an NPE occurring in the last 100 years or so. They may or may not list the correct father. assume that just because they 9. Recruit the most distant cousin you can find to test for DNA. If you match, haven’t made a match in the then you know that the NPE occurred at or before your common ancestor. If project, it must be due to an that cousin doesn’t match your “DNA surname,” but matches others with your “given surname” then you can be relatively certain the NPE occurred in a NPE. They may be the first more recent generation. This at minimum can give you some parameters of of a Webb line to test. On time for your search. the other hand, there are One shouldn’t automatically assume that just because they haven’t made a match in instances when there are very the project, it must be due to an NPE. They may be the first of a Webb line to test. clear signs that an NPE has On the other hand, there are instances when there are very clear signs that an NPE likely occurred at some point has likely occurred at some point in their line. in their line.” Of course, breaks in DNA can go undetected if they occurred hundreds of years ago, and many, many generations have passed. We may eventually uncover or prove some ancient NPE’s within our project, but whether an NPE occurred 50 years ago or 500 years ago, I hold the opinion that it isn’t only the DNA that makes us a Webb, but more importantly, it is the relationships and family itself that make us Webbs. DNA testing is the science and the tool we use to trace our heritage, but it can’t measure the love, traditions and the family connections. Those are the things, along with our shared history, that truly link us to our family names. Note: All of our members have a connection to a Webb family through either a male or female line. Some have proven their Webb connection by DNA; others, although participants in DNA testing, rely on strong paper trails to prove their connection. This article was written with our Y-DNA participants in mind, whether they have the Webb surname or know they are Webbs by DNA, but go by another name. I acknowledge that we have many members who are not participants in the Y-DNA aspect of our project, but the information provided here can be applied to any surname and surname DNA project where an NPE has been discovered or suspected. I hope that everyone will find the ideas presented here useful if they suspect a non-paternity event. Sources and Further Reading: http://dgmweb.net/DNA/General/NPE_Resolutions.html http://www.isogg.org/npe.htm http://www.isogg.org/fgd.htm http://www.englishdna.com/topics.htm http://www.thegeneticgenealogist.com/2007/06/27/genetic-genealogy-and-non- paternal-events/ http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~gkbopp/DNA/falsepaternal.htm Artwork: http://etc.usf.edu/clipart/ THE WEBB BULLETIN Page 4 WEBB Records Repository: Alabama 1860 Census, Alabama – Dale, Dallas, Dekalb, Fayette & Franklin Dale Co.