Don't know any of my DNA matches!!

[Lol-R]

My dad has a fairly straight-forward family - the were all born and died in Liverpool, UK, except for a few who emigrated to Australia.  My mums family is very complicated!  She was born in Liverpool, UK in 1940 when her 2 older siblings were evacuated to Wales.  Mums mum lived in the slums in Liverpool and her husband had died in 1938.  He was the father of the two elder children. Mum was born in secret and then given away to a rich family in (possibly) Neston or Wirral.  Mum had her own butler and maid with this family and her real mum visited her once or twice until the age of 4.  When she turned 5 the people who were looking after her, and whom she referred to as Mummy and Daddy, got in touch with her biological mother and asked if they could formally adopt her before she became of school age.  For some unknown reason they were told 'no' and she came and took my mum back to the slums with her.  She was then introduced to her 13 year old brother and 11 year old sister as their little sister who they had known nothing about!  I did both Ancestry and 23andme DNA tests and I received literally thousands of names.  The ones on my dads side I recognised but there are literally hundreds of names which I haven't got a clue about on mums side.  A lot of the names are foreign and I've inherited a strange mix of heritage, including Native American, Isian and Eastern European.  My cousin says that she vaguely remembers my nan meeting a foreign guy during the war years but he wasnt in the military and he was stranded in this country until the was ended and he went back to his family.  Its possible he knew nothing about my mum. 

Can anyone advise please?

[bearkat]

Take it one step at a time.

Was a father named on your mother's birth certificate?

Ancestry will tell which matches are likely to be from your maternal or paternal side.  Concentrate on your closest maternal matches and try to eliminate people with names that you know from her mother's family.  That should leave you with possible relatives/ancestors from her father's family.

You then could search for the names on the 1939 register, births marriages & deaths in the area etc.. With Native American ancestry I wondered if her father was an American soldier but it seems that the US didn't start sending troop to the UK until December 1941. Liverpool was a busy port with many people passing through.

[Lol-R]

There is no father on mums birth certificate. The nearest relatives I have on her side are 4th-6th cousins. I have emailed a few of them and the only reply I had was from a lady who is from a Portuguese American family but we can’t figure out how we are related. The surname De Burgo from Cape Verde keeps coming up and part of my breakdown is Cape Verde. I’ve no idea how to proceed

[brigidmac]

Start with your potential American Portuguese origin grandfather



Colour code all your maternal matches who have ethnicity which is likely from him.

regardless of names in their trees

Have a colour for the Debungo name too
& A colour for all the people who are shared matches to your top match .

I did this for my cousin and we came.up.with.a potential common ancestor which I added..on a floating branch.until.we could join the dots

Good luck.

[Lol-R]

Thanks, Ill concentrate on the Portugese American side and see where it gets me.  My nan did give a few 'hints' but they turned out to be red herrings which doesn't help!

[brigidmac]

It really helps if other family members get tested too

If your. Half maternal cousins or their children do a dna test it would also be revealing in which of your matches they do NOT share

Usually people recommend that oldest generation test but sometimes a younger person can have a higher match to one branch

For example my nephew has some matches that I don't he seems to have inherited proportionally  more DNA from my mother's paternal grandfather and less from her maternal grandfather with different ethnicities.

[Biggles50]

If you do not have a Birth Certificate for your Mother then that is where to start, I’d also obtain the Birth Certificates for all your Siblings and your Mother’s siblings.

I suggest that joining a local Family History Society will help you develop your Genealogy far quicker.

If you are over a certain age then additionally there is likely to be a U3A organisation pretty near to you and they to will have a Family History or Genealogy Group.

Both these will offer help and assistance.

There is only so much we can do here

[Kloumann]

If your nearest match is 4th to 6th cousin, this would take you back about 5 generations. I have a 4th to 6th which I know the common ancestor is one of my 2nd great grandfathers, born 1819.

Cape Verdi was a Portuguese colony.

There were many Americans came over as volunteers to the UK to fight, particularly pilots in the RAF in 1940. It was illegal for them but the US Gov did pardon them in 1944.
From Wikipedia:-
"Before America entered World War II in December 1941, individual Americans volunteered to fight against the Axis powers in other nations' armed forces. Although under American law, it was illegal for United States citizens to join the armed forces of foreign nations, and in doing so, they lost their citizenship, many American volunteers changed their nationality to Canadian. However, Congress passed a blanket pardon in 1944.[12] American mercenary Colonel Charles Sweeny began recruiting American citizens to fight as a US volunteer detachment in the French Air Force, however France fell before this was implemented.[12] During the Battle of Britain, 11 American pilots flew in the Royal Air Force. Charles Sweeney's nephew, also named Charles, formed a Home Guard unit from American volunteers living in London."

[Lol-R]

If your nearest match is 4th to 6th cousin, this would take you back about 5 generations. I have a 4th to 6th which I know the common ancestor is one of my 2nd great grandfathers, born 1819.

Cape Verdi was a Portuguese colony.

Ah, that makes sense then. I’m receiving matches and messages from people who are Portuguese American and who themselves have roots in Cape Verde. I have Cape Verde and Native America as my DNA matches.