We Are All Cousins

In our VICK and Allied Families DNA Project at 23andMe we are looking for people who match more than one of our project members. The hope is that some of these people will lead us to discover some of the missing names in our collective family tree. I have also noticed that my wife and I have some of the same predicted cousins at 23andMe. One lady matches two other members of our project in addition to me. I noticed she also matches my wife. Seeing that my wife and I match the same person (we actually have more than one shared match) caused me to start thinking about where my pedigree would first join my wife’s pedigree. Years ago when I was researching my father’s pedigree I found that my mother and my dad were 4th cousins, one time removed (their shared ancestors were Shadrach MERCER and his wife Rhoda PRICE).

At some point all of our pedigrees begin to merge, so it is just a question of how far back we have to go in each line to find that point. Yesterday I was researching the pedigree of the lady who matches the other two descendants of Joseph Vick, my wife, and me. Relative Finder predicted this lady was my “Distant Cousin.” Relative Finder also predicted she was my wife’s distant cousin. I found that the lady and I are 11th cousins. Our shared ancestor was Rev. Haute WYATT (born June 4, 1594, in Maidstone, Kent, England). Rev. WYATT was the brother of Francis WYATT, the first English colonial governor of Virginia. The lady I matched is a descendant of Rev. WYATT’s first wife and I am a descendant of his second wife.

After finding how the lady and I are related, I started looking for how she is related to my wife. Both had the surname MOORE in their pedigrees, so their MOORE lines seemed like a good place to start the search. As I looked at my wife’s pedigree I realized that the MOORE was a mistake. I had her as one of my wife’s 4th great grandmothers. Other trees showed that the correct name of this 4th great grandmother was Mary CLEMENS (actually CLEMMONS as it turned out). Mary’s father and mother were Samuel Thompson CLEMMONS (born March 15, 1751) and Martha COGGINS (born in 1756). When I looked back at my pedigree I realized these were my 5th great grandparents (in my father’s line), so my wife and I are 6th cousins.

My wife also matches three people that my mother matches. Maybe as I am researching all of their lines I will find a common ancestor of my wife and my mother.