DNA Research Into My Collins Line

by

Sean Wright

Email Sean

Sean Wright is a direct descendant of Burgess Collins who is a match to Benjamin Collins; Born 1800 Hancock County, Tennessee

found on the Core Melungeon DNA Project.

This is a brief summary of the current results of my research conducted over the past year. At this point, I conclu de that the close genetic relationships of my particular genetic haplogroup  did not originate with the West African slave trade, but in Pre-Roman Europe. My own paternal line ancestry has been traced back to a Burgess Collins, born around 1796, in Giles County, Virginia.

This precise area of Giles County was once part of Montgomery County, Virginia, and was a major settlement in the New World. A majority of this settlement's populated was protestant Palatine Germans. Many Collins families in and around these areas do not match my line and are of the haplogroup R1a. The Y-DNA Haplogroup R1, much like MT-DNA X, is found on both sides of the Atlantic. Most, if not all, of these Collins are Native American in origin and likely of the Saponi Tribe. My research has not turned up any Indian or African admixture along my own paternal line, but does not rule out admixture among genetic relatives who share the same Y-DNA. Surnames in my group include: Collins, Goins, Williams and Price.

What piqued my interest and initiated the deviation from the "establishments'" point of view was a genetic relative who allowed me to view their FT-DNA "recent ancestral origins" page (I tested with Ancestry.com). Their MDKO (most distant known origin) was listed as Germany. Sure, it's a known fact that during WWI the French stationed Senegalese were stationed along the border with Germany. After the war (and during the war) these troops had children with German women; the offspring were known as "Rhineland Bastards."

After a few email exchanges with an FT-DNA spokesperson, who is also a geneticist, I was able to confirm the German match was indeed a real German whose ancestry was ancient in that country. Thus, I first trekked into seemingly forbidden realms that most of the aforementioned "establishment" would balk at. I had uploaded my own results to various Y-DNA websites where visitors could compare their DNA results with others.

I was convinced that our line was of a Portuguese/Spanish Moor origin until I found the German match . This belief was further enhanced when I found a match at Genebase.com, surnamed Nieves-Morales. Several attempts at contact with this individual were made, but none were successful. He was a distant match, so contact was not a priority. Another member of the DNA-forums, who is E1b1a8a and Caucasian, says in reference to a scholarly paper "Ghanaian, Nigerian and Cameroonian DNA." http://www.biomedcen...1471-2148/10/92

"...the rarity of your haplotype makes it look like you might not be off the beam in suspecting a possible Moorish connection. (The extreme commonness of my own haplotype makes me feel right at home!)"

An African specific haplogroup is E1b1a7a3; our group has tested negative for this mutation. In other studies, E1b1a8 and subclades have been considered to be more West African. At first, I considered our group to be of Moorish origin, perhaps those who traveled from the Iberian peninsula to the rest of Europe and the British Isles.

This paper only revealed 5 markers. When I entered these same 5 markers into the Yrd.org search database, my resulting closest match was an individual of English descent who resided in London.

Eurasian Metapopulation: Found 1 of 49147 matching haplotypes

East Asian Metapopulation: Found 2 of 19969 matching haplotypes

African Metapopulation: Found 4 of 4857 matching haplotypes

The Eurasian match is in London, United Kingdom [English], African- Marajó, Brazil [Afrobrazilian], African American(Illinois and Texas), East Asian-South Korea [Korean].

So with a rare sequence of haplotypes, 1 of 287 in a city of 15,000,000, minus "dys390" which I think is instrumental in defining our E1b1a, you have 1 of 738 in Cologne, Germany [German].

Of course Yrd.org and other open databases such as Sorenson's have much more African samples than European. So it would be next to impossible to avoid a match an Africa.

www.yhrd.org/Search http://www.smgf.org/

Another individual, from DNA-forums, is African-American and one I would consider and expert on E1b1a, stated several times that E1b1a8 is West African while E1b1a7 is more widespread.

"So far, I have most similar and most frequent STR markers to the Igbo and Ibibio people. This might change with more markers." Another quote: "E1b1a8, as far as I know, never went much farther than Africa until two or three hundred years or so ago. E1b1a7 is spread across Africa but tends to decline in frequency in the few tested samples as you get father west in West Africa. E1b1a7a3a is the only subclade of E1b1a7 that I have ever seen in West African-Americans so that raises questions about the other subclades. "

The E1b1a7a3a subclade is what members of our group tested negative for. Thus, I became further disenfranchised that we were E1b1a at all. St. Clair research, which is not open to to public viewing, has found E1b1a among it's members claiming descent from William the Conquerer. Are they E1b1a?

http://www.stclairresearch.com/content/storiesConqueror.html

See:  Adam Price and Nancy Collins    and  Price Genealogy