Solving an NPE

Are all Forgy, or Forgeys, related? That was one question I wanted to answer with DNA. According to a 1950’s family history all early Forgeys in America were likely related

Only one Forgy Y tested previous to when I began my DNA group, and they were in the I1 haplogroup

The first distant in a different line who tested didn’t match this Forgy (one Forgey was from an early Tennessee line the other was from a Pennsylvania line)

It appeared all Forgys weren’t related My Forgey distant cousin belonged to a different haplo group

than the first tester To find the most common Forgy Forgey haplogroup we expanded

the number of testers. We now have a 7 cousins from different lines who share the most common Forgy, Forgey haplogroup which is I2a. This haplogroup is shared by a Forgie who came to America from Northern Ireland much later than the other families, which confirms this haplogroup is associated with the Forgies in Ireland and maybe Scotland?

I decided to ask the Forgy that didn’t match to compare against another of their own cousins

We were shocked to find the other person who tested didn’t match their own 5th cousin nor did they match our other group members? They are also in completely different haplogroups. This Forgy is in the R1b haplogroup. We have Forgey, Forgys in 3 haplogroups I1a, R1b, I2a

Both cousins are supposed to descend from John Forgy and Jane Miller. You’ll also notice a Beatty ancestor in the previous generation

The Forgy cousin with the R1B Haplogroup had many matches. One of which was a Beatty from the same area of Pennsylvania

Coincidental match? Or did a Forgy adopt a Beatty child?

Robert has 908 Y DNA matches which does increase the chances of a coincidental match

This would seem to be an unlikely coincidence however

The same R1b cousin also had a Ferguson match (Forgy is a variant of Ferguson).

Many of the I1 haplogroups matches are Scandinavian. Not Scottish like the Forgeys

The Y test couldn’t answer why these cousins didn’t match. We then turned to atDNA testing

The father of our R1b Y tester took the atDNA test in order to get a better reach back in time

The I1 tester is in his 80’s so we also got a good reach back in time with him

We were now dealing with two 4th cousins. They definitely could have matched but they didn’t?

Not all 4th cousins match however

Autosomal DNA results

Our R1b tester did have a match with Forgy in their tree His Forgy cousin shared one 42 cM segment and one 7 cM

segment We later learned they are 3rd cousins. One generation before the

I1 match. Meaning this didn’t preclude an event occurring after the John Forgy and Jane Miller generation

This cousin also had a Forgie match, suggesting there actually is a blood relationship to the Forgey family? So they may not be related only on the Beatty line

Checking to see if perhaps the I1 cousin matched the 3rd cousin, they didn’t match either

The two third cousins ancestors Warren and Nellie Forgy’s family on group sheet. Newton was the son of John Forgy and Jane Miller who were the ancestors of our non matches

Our I1 haplogroup atDNA tester had an interesting Beatty match. This Beatty was also from Pennsylvania

There is still no resolution to the non matching cousins predicament? What we do know is the R1b Forgy is somehow descended from the Newton Forgy

and Phoebe Taylor family. It probably is unlikely that two siblings were adopted by Newton and Phoebe but we should still keep an open mind to that possibility

One thing we have established is there is a blood relationship between two Forgy 3rd cousins

The I1 cousin has a Beatty match from PA but this could be a coincidence? It is a small segment match

If the I1 cousin tests at AncestryDNA they may get a better idea as to whether they have a blood relationship to any early Forgy families. Family Tree DNA’s database isn’t large enough to provide enough Forgys to compare with. So far they have no Forgy matches

When I examined the family group sheets of all of the families going back to their earliest ancestors I didn’t see anything that would suggest there was a line break. I also looked at Census records which didn’t offer any clues either? This is a real mystery