How can I locate Scottish ancestors in my family tree?
Hi Everyone! On LivingDNA, I show about 7% Scottish ancestry, specifically from Aberdeenshire. How can I search my tree in Family Search to find my Scottish ancestors? If I have a list, I can start looking for those from Aberdeenshire.
Debra Jones
Best Answer
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I'm not familiar with LivingDNA but you need to understand that DNA tests that show X% of a certain ancestry are only ever an estimate and can detect stuff that goes generations back. At first the last point seems great but it becomes frustrating and arguably useless if it's detecting (in your case) Aberdeenshire ancestors from the 1400s (say). They might, for example, have moved south in the 1500s, even (shock, horror) crossing the Border into England by the time that parish registers began.
Essentially, you have to do the hard work of checking your ancestry in FamilySearch and looking at where those ancestors are born. There's no short cut, I'm afraid, as it's perfectly possible that some sloppy research has merged (making something up) your Thomas Mackintosh from Aberdeen with a Thomas Macintosh from York and your ancestry in FamilySearch is going off in the wrong direction entirely.
I would say that showing your family tree in FamilySearch as a fan chart can be useful. It only shows 7 generations back from the root person (usually you) but you can get it to colour the boxes in by Birth Place, with a different colour assigned to England, Scotland, etc… (well, those are the options I get). With any luck you might find some Scottish ancestry within that 7 generation chart and you can then reclick to show the next set of 7 from a new person in the fan (if your ancestry goes back that far in FS).
Good luck…
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