Exactly one year ago I posted “Katrine – REALLY Far Away – 52 Ancestors 2015 #6.” The theme for the week was “So Far Away,” and I thought, who is more distant than my female ancestor who purportedly gave rise to the mitochondrial haplogroup K? My subclade is K1a2b and it is no surprise that this group is found in Germany.
I haven’t found much new information from the last year on my haplogroup or my subclade, but I do have an important update to my maternal ancestry. I wrote this last year:
My mitochondrial DNA followed this path:
Catharina Helfrich – born about 1814, probably in the Rhine-Pfalz, Germany (2x great-grandmother)
Julia Magdalena Stephan – born 1858, Ripley, Ohio (great-grandmother)
Alma Elisabeth Maier – born 1893, Cincinnati, Ohio (grandmother)
Alice Claire Lindner – born Cincinnati, Ohio (mother)
Me
As it turned out, my second great-grandmother’s maiden name was not Helfrich. This information came from the death certificates of two of her daughters, but it was wrong. This year I learned that he true name was Catharina Elsässer and she was born in 1813 in Vinningen in the southwest Rhine-Pfalz of Germany. This major breakthrough gave me a far more extensive maternal line:
Margarita (unknown) – wife of Joannes Eisner
Catharina Eisner – born 1704, Germany (6x great-grandmother)
Maria Appolonia Ringe – born 1733, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (5x great-grandmother)
Catharina Schatz – born 1759, Kröppen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (4x great-grandmother)
Anna Odilia Greiner – born 1790, Vinningen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (3x great-grandmother)
Catharina Elsässer – born 1813, Vinningen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (2x great-grandmother)
Julia Magdalena Stephan – born 1858, Ripley, Ohio (great-grandmother)
Alma Elisabeth Maier – born1893, Cincinnati, Ohio (grandmother)
Alice Claire Lindner – born Cincinnati, Ohio (mother)
Me
This is a lot of progress to have made in one year, although I am looking for additional sources for Maria Appollonia Ringe and her forbears. The line of Catharina Schatz and forward is well-documented. I have autosomal DNA that connects me back to Catharina Schatz or her husband Joannes Greiner.
I read your first entry about your mitochondrial DNA and today this one. My mother is also K1a2b though her furthest known maternal ancestor was Elizabeth Turner. Through DNA, I have found another generation back: Elizabeth Lehman (1791-1882) in Fairfield county, Ohio. Lehman is a German name! Because all of my mom’s closest matches on FTDNA are French Canadian, I was expecting someone French, not German. Well, it looks like (not yet confirmed) that Elizabeth Lehman’s parents were Jacob Adam Lehman and Hannah Peterson (Netherlands). I guess I am telling you this because this haplotype we share is not all that common and you also have family members in Ohio with German ancestry. In the spirit of no stone unturned, I feel like I should look at your tree to see if there may be any connections. Do you have a tree on ancestry that you can share? Autosomal DNA that I can compare with my Mom? Anything else that might help uncover some clues? Thank you!
Hello, Lisa! I tested my mtDNA at FamilyTree DNA. I guess we can share a haplogroup and still not be that closely related. But it is interesting that you were finding matches who were French Canadian. My direct maternal line is from the Southwest Pfalz near Pirmasens (Eppenbrunn and Vinningen) which borders the French Department of Moselle. I do have a tree on Ancestry which can be found here: https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/tree/31777819/family?cfpid=18121298493
The view I’m sending starts with my mom and you can go straight back her maternal line. I’d be happy to discuss further. If you are on Ancestry, you can try messaging me there or look me up on Facebook as Cheryl Biermann Hartley. Thanks for posting!