For some time I've been working on a family history mystery. The records for my great-grandfather, James Geake, state he was born in 1881 at Wapsworthy, a small farm a couple of miles away from the village of Peter Tavy and about five miles from the town of Tavistock in Devon. He was purportedly the son of George Geake and Maria Dearing, both of whose ancestry traces further back in Devon. However, DNA analysis suggests all is not what it seems.

I have access to a number of DNA kits belonging to people who descend from James Geake but I've not been able to find any useful DNA matches on either the Geake or the Dearing side. Most of these relatives have a lot of Irish and Scottish ethnicity in their DNA which I suspect is on James' line and this doesn't fit at all with James supposedly having ancestors from Devon.

Here are the Irish and Scottish AncestryDNA ethnicity estimates for my relatives.

My mum - Ireland: 30%, Scotland: 20%.
My aunt - Ireland: 28%, Scotland: 21%.
My mum's 1st cousin No.1 - Ireland: 38%, Scotland: 12%.
My mum's 1st cousin No.2 - Ireland: 30%, Scotland: 65% (we are related to this person on her father's side but her mother was from Scotland so this would explain the higher Scottish ethnicity).
My mum's 1st cousin once removed No.1 - Ireland: 23%, Scotland: 16%.
My mum's 1st cousin once removed No.2 - Ireland: 18%, Scotland: 15%.


AncestryDNA Genetic Communities for the descendants of James Geake
The map shows the Irish DNA genetic communities at Ancestry which are specific to some of these relatives. Mum's 1st cousin No.1 has all of these regions. My aunt has all but the small region of North Leitrim & East Sligo. My mum shows North Connacht and the region of North East Mayo & North West Sligo but not North Mayo and no Central Ireland. Mum's 1st cousin No.2 just has North East Mayo & North West Sligo but no other Irish regions. The two 1st cousins once removed don't have specific Irish genetic communities but my mum passed the North East Mayo & North West Sligo region on to me. This demonstrates a strong connection to these areas amongst the four of James Geake's grandchildren who have tested. There surely has to be something in this!

It's worth noting that my mum and aunt do in fact have Devon genetic communities as does one of the 1st cousins once removed. This can be explained by the fact that James Geake's wife had Devon ancestry so Devon ancestors will be common to all of the above mentioned relatives. James Geake and his wife, Sarah May Hellyer, were my mum's paternal grandparents but there were North Devon ancestors on my mum's maternal grandmother's side too.

All these ethnicity estimates and the lack of the expected DNA connections was pointing in the direction of James Geake not being George Geake and Maria Dearing's son. Now I wanted to find some further evidence to substantiate my theory.

James Geake had an older sister called Maria Geake who married Henry Albert Carpenter. My mum knew her as her Great-aunt Maria (pronounced Mariah as in Mariah Carey). Mum has always known Maria's grand-daughter who I'll call Emily to protect her identity. Emily kindly agreed to take a DNA test and the results came back showing no match to any of the descendants of James Geake. Emily should have been my mum's 2nd cousin and all 2nd cousins should share DNA. Even half 2nd cousins would be expected to share DNA but there is no match to any of Emily's four supposed 2nd cousins.

Emily has DNA connections on the Geake and Dearing lines so this indicates that James was the odd one out. In addition, she only has 6% Irish ethnicity and no Scottish ethnicity. Therefore, my long-held suspicion that James Geake was not the son of his documented parents seems to be correct.

I would add that there are one or two distant DNA matches that we have in common with Emily which I think are likely to be co-incidences. Emily has a lot of Devon ancestry and, as previously stated, so do we. Autosomal DNA can't tell you which family line you are looking at when you see a match so a lot of time is spent studying family trees to find ancestors in common with your DNA matches. There's a good chance that our DNA might match with descendants of Devon ancestors which also match with Emily but on different branches of our families. At first glance, they look like Geake and Dearing connections but we now know this is unlikely unless we have a more distant connection to these families back in time.

It's disappointing to discover that we're not biologically related to Emily and her family but, nonetheless, her ancestors are still part of my own family's story as James was brought up in the Geake household as one of their own. In my mind that makes Emily's ancestors my 'adoptive' family and there are still descendants of James who bear the Geake name to this day.

One final anecdote - a relative once told my mum that James Geake used to celebrate his birthday on the 23rd January but, much later in life, he obtained a copy of his birth certificate. This was when he discovered he was actually born on the 25th. It makes me wonder if he really was born on the 23rd before being handed to the Geakes a couple of days later. What's more, did James ever know they weren't his biological parents?

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

I remember that day when I waved my Grandpa Hibbitt (Charles George Hibbitt) off in Greenbank Hospital in Plymouth fifty years ago. Although I was only nine years old, I had a sixth sense that it was the last time I would see my Gramps. There he stood in his red dressing gown with a rope-type belt tied tightly in the middle of his emaciated frame. He was dying of lung cancer and it wasn't too long before he succumbed to his illness.


The Hibbitt Family 1968 - Gran and Grandpa, dad, me and my elder brother
I woke up on Sunday morning, the 8th October 1972, to find mum downstairs in the lounge. She told me that dad had set off in the car to East Allington to collect my Gran from the village she and Grandpa lived in. There had been a phone call earlier to say that Grandpa didn't have long. He had previously been moved from the hospital in Plymouth to the one in Kingsbridge, some four and a half miles from where my grandparents lived. In the time it took for my dad to fetch Gran and then get to the hospital, it was too late, they had missed him by a few minutes. I still have the goodbye note which he left for my dad and the rest of our family. I presume Gran had one too but I don't know for sure.

The funeral took place on the 12th in the Church at East Allington but, as was often the case with children in those days, I had no idea it was happening. I was probably at school and I wasn't told anything about it. Grandpa was buried in his sister's grave at Drake Memorial Park and I have a photograph of the flowers which were laid on the grave afterwards.


Flowers laid shortly after Grandpa's burial
Some will know that Drake Memorial Park is on the outskirts of Plymouth and I pass it every time I visit my parents. The plaque was repainted a few years ago and every now and again I go into the cemetery and pay my respects. I will never forget you Grandpa!


The plaque after it was repainted
Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

The North American and Daily Advertiser, (Philadelphia, PA) - 26 August 1844
Some time ago, whilst I was trying to investigate my 3 x great-grandmother, Harriet Catherine Dando, nee Williams, I came across this notice in the North American and Daily Advertiser, (Philadelphia, PA) dated Monday 26th August 1844. Harriet was the fifth wife of my 3 x great-grandfather, Joseph Dando, the Younger.

I'd originally found myself a bit stumped as to who everyone mentioned in the article was but I've finally managed to piece it all together. The Joseph mentioned was likely to be my 3 x great-grandfather's son, Joseph Clifford Dando, born in 1830 to his second wife, Helen Sheriff (or Stirling). There's some ambiguity over her surname. Then Charles is probably Charles Sterling Dando, born in 1833. He was baptised as Charles Sheriff Dando but later went by the name Sterling Dando. There were other Charles Dandos living at that time so this had initially led to some confusion.

Then there was the question of who was Stephano Dando, as it looked in the article. I'd previously thought it was meant to read as Stephen Dando. Joseph Dando, the Younger, had an Uncle Stephen who was still alive and lived in New York so I'd wondered if he might have travelled home to visit family. Not so.

Various Dando descendants around the globe have in their possession handwritten family trees and these all mention a Stevannah Dando but I could find no record of someone by that name. According to these family trees, she was purportedly the daughter of Joseph Dando, the Younger, and his third wife, Jane Clark, whom he married in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1836. Jane died on 31st December 1839.

Then recently, I found a burial and death record for a Stephana Dando in Bristol in 1847. She lived at Castle Green where I know her father, Joseph, lived around then. She was 9 years old when she was buried on 2 April 1847 in the Parish of St Augustine the Less, thus she would have been born in about 1838, most likely in Philadelphia, which fits with the timeframe when Joseph was married to Jane. The 1844 journey to England would confirm why her death was recorded in this country.

I'm in the habit of considering name variatons when researching family history but I've never before come across the name, Stephana, (not to mention the Stevannah misspelling) so this is why I'd had difficulty in joining all the dots.

Something I still haven't ascertained is when did Joseph Dando, the Younger, travel back to England. Joseph and Harriet had my 2 x great-grandfather, William Elbert Dando, in 1843. When did he come back to England and why did such a young child not travel with his mother? Perhaps one day I'll find Joseph and William Elbert together on a passenger list.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

Not long ago, Ancestry introduced a new DNA tool called Ethnicity Inheritance where they apparently show you which ethnicities you have inherited from each parent - even if your parents haven't taken DNA tests.

As it happens, both of my parents have tested so I was curious to see how the ethnicity inheritance results on my own and my younger brother's tests compared to my parents' actual DNA ethnicity results. Remember, these ethnicity splits are ignoring my parents' actual tests and just estimating the split using their technology they call SideView and applying it to my and my brother's results. It's also worth bearing in mind that we only receive half of each parent's DNA leaving half that we don't. In addition, the 50% you receive is random which is just as well otherwise we'd all be identical twins to our siblings!

Ancestry initially label the parents as Parent 1 and Parent 2 and it's up to you to label them yourself if you think you can work out which side is which. You need to have studied your family tree to do this and you'll want some variation between each parent. I'm fairly confident that I have the paternal and maternal side correct and so I added these labels manually.

Below you'll firstly see the ethnicity results taken directly from my parents' DNA kits and then you'll see my and my brother's actual ethnicity results together with what Ancestry believe we each received from each parent.


My Dad's DNA Ethnicity


My Mum's DNA Ethnicity


My Ethnicity Breakdown


My Brother's Ethnicity Breakdown

As stated, we don't get an exact 50% split from each parent's individual ethnicity but, for the purposes of this exercise, I've halved their figures to see how my brother and I compare to our parents.

Half of my dad's ethnicity would be...

England & Northwest Europe: 41%
Norway: 3.5%
Wales: 3%
Scotland: 1.5%
Sweden & Denmark: 1%

Half of my mum's ethnicity would be...

England & Northwest Europe: 23%
Ireland: 16%
Scotland: 8%
Norway: 1.5%
Wales: 1.5%

So what do we see?

Both my brother and I received a fairly accurate split of England & Northwest Europe from each parent. I'm a little top heavy on the Ireland region whereas my brother has a lot more from Scotland. I seem to have all of my dad's Norway whereas my brother received a little from both parents. I got my dad's 2% Sweden & Denmark but my brother has none and, for me, the Wales was a fairly good split between each parent but my brother got all his Wales from my mum.

It's interesting to note that, when I went into the ethnicity inheritance estimates for my parents, I wasn't able to work out which parent was which when I looked at my dad's split. Ancestry believe my dad received 43% England & Northwest Europe from one parent and 39% from the other and the smaller regions don't really give me any clues.

I was much more confident with my mum's estimate as she received 44% England & Northwest Europe from one parent and only 2% from the other. This would account for my gran's North Devon and Somerset ancestry. Mum also shows 32% Ireland and 16% Scotland from the other parent only and this is born out by the fact that my aunt and two more of their paternal first cousins (who have quite distinctive splits) point to similar results on my grandpa's side of the family. Scotland and Ireland have close ties in genetic terms. I still have not identified where this DNA comes from but I have a suspicion that my grandfather's father, James Geake, might not have been the son of the parents named on his birth certificate.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

On 9th April 1882, my great-grandmother, Alice Dando, nee Free, was born in Hadstock, a village in Essex not far from Saffron Walden. Her father, Stephen Free, was 66 years old when she was born and was much older than her mother, who was his second wife. Sadly Stephen died within the year but her mother lived until 1921.

Alice had a nickname of Benny and is pictured aged 4. My dad remembers her as a sweet, kind, very petite lady. She died in 1954 at the age of 71 and was cremated at Efford Crematorium in Plymouth.


Alice Free, aged 4
Today also marks the passing of my great-uncle, Charles Henry Martin in 1942. He was born in 1903 in Twerton-on-Avon, Bath, Somerset, and married my great-aunt, Nellie Gertrude Hibbitt, in 1927. Charles was in the royal navy and reached the rank of Lieutenant Commander. Sadly during WWII, his ship, HMS Hermes, was sunk by the Japanese off Ceylon (present day Sri Lanka). Most of the survivors were rescued by a nearby hospital ship, although 307 men from Hermes were lost, including Charles.

Charles and Nell never had any children. He is commemorated on the Plymouth Naval Memorial on Plymouth Hoe on Panel 63, Column 1.


Charles Henry Martin
Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

The Service Orders, Leave Clearance Certificates, etc. file
About seven years ago, I began scanning some documents in a file which had belonged to Harvey's Grandad Ellen, labelled "Service Orders, Leave Clearance Certificates, etc.". It was jam-packed with papers and forms spanning the whole of his career starting from when he joined the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) in 1915 right through to the end of his career in the Royal Air Force (RAF) in 1946.

The scanning was a big task and I found myself pausing about a third of the way through the pile. That pause was only halted at the end of December last year when I picked up the job once again.

Since arriving at the end of this particular digitisation project, I've now produced a web page which outlines the long and varied career of Air Commodore Cyril Norman Ellen D.F.C. which can be viewed here.

I found his career very interesting which included; undertaking Observer duties in the First World War when he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, flying the Cairo to Baghdad Airmail Route at its inception in 1921, writing a wireless course for the RAF Cadet College in 1927, Commanding No. 5 (AC) Squadron in Quetta when the notorious earthquake hit the region in 1935, commanding three RAF technical training schools during the Second World War, assisting the Deputy Chief of Air Division in Berlin in 1946, and then going on to hold appointments with the Control Commission under the Foreign Office.

I met Harvey about 18 months after his grandad died which is a real shame as I would have liked to have known him.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

Going through some old family papers, I came across part of a magazine article which was kept by Harvey's parents. It shows Nelson Mandela in his house. What is remarkable is that there's a painting in the background depicting the houses in Fore Street, Newlyn where Harvey lived when he was a child.


Nelson Mandela in his house

Close-up of the painting on the wall
I don't know this particular painting but there have been many paintings of this view produced over the years, particularly by the Newlyn School of Artists.


The houses photographed in 2018
There have been quite a number of changes to the properties since the painting was completed but you can still see the likeness to the modern-day photograph.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

Not only is it the 49th anniversary of my Grandpa Hibbitt's (Charles George Hibbitt) death today but I have only just realised that his father, Alfred Charles Newbold Hibbitt, was baptized on this day in 1873, exactly 99 years before my Grandpa died.


Baptism of Alfred Charles Newbold Hibbitt
Alfred was actually born in 1869 but he wasn't baptized until he was four years old. I have had a question mark over Alfred's paternity for a little while due to the lack of DNA matches beyond him, although the hiccup could possibly have occurred at his father's generation instead. His father, being an only child, makes it difficult to establish which generation the non-paternal event can be attributed to.

We have plenty of DNA matches on Alfred's mothers' side (Pitcher) but going back on the Hibbitt side or on his purported grandmother's side (Newbold) has proved fruitless in terms of the DNA. His father was supposedly born in the Rutland area and Alfred was born in Birmingham. We have very few meaningful DNA connections to Rutland but a number of matches which converge in the Midlands area which I have yet to tie down.

It's possible that Alfred's parents didn't immediately get around to having him baptized for any number reasons. A younger brother, William Henry Hibbitt, wasn't baptized until he was two when it appears he was very close to death. Alfred was baptized just over a fortnight later when the matter might have felt more pressing to his parents so the 'late' baptism may have no connection to any questionable parentage at all.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

Posting photographs, cine and video footage of my Granny Geake (born Phyllis Grace Weaver: 1916-2005) on what would have been her 105th birthday. Known as Phyl, she was born in Tavistock in Devon ten days after her father was killed in WWI. Orphaned before the age of five, she went to live with her maternal grandparents where she later said she was somewhat spoilt by her uncles. After her grandmother died in 1925, Phyllis lived with her aunt, Edith Ellen Martin, and uncle, John Luxton Martin. The environment was stricter but Phyllis later said it did her good. She was intelligent but was denied a place at the grammar school because she had no father.

She married my Grandpa in 1938 and they lived in Tavistock all their married lives. However, the Second World War meant they didn't see each other for four years between 1941 and 1945. During this time Phyllis developed an overactive thyroid and became gravely ill before having an operation to remove the gland.

Phyllis worked in Leonard's Shoe Shop and also in a newsagent's shop as well as helping my Grandpa with his fruit and vegetable round. She took great pleasure in her grandchildren and great-grandchildren and was well known for her broad Devonshire accent and raucous laugh. She was plucky, generous and hospitable, always wanting to feed you up whenever you visited. She laid on many family Christmases and when I stayed with her as a child, we always stopped for elevenses which was a special one-to-one time.

Phyllis finally left Tavistock in 2004 to go to live in a retirement flat in Plymouth but not before organising the sale of nearly all of her furniture (and not through the internet either). She died the following year, leaving a big hole in the family where a kind and bright personality once was.


This video can also be viewed on my YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSyLHS1HD2M and in my website video gallery.

Music: The Entertainer (1902, piano roll) by Scott Joplin

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]

The weather was perfect on that day in October 1999 when my family visited the town of Merville in France. It was the early days of the internet and I used my dial-up connection to organise the trip, feeling quite proud of myself arranging the hotel and train and bus journeys, all without being able to speak French.

My gran, Phyllis Grace Geake, nee Weaver, had never seen her father's grave until that day. Henry James Weaver died on 8th September 1916, killed by accident in WWI when a hand-grenade detonated prematurely whilst the men were training at the base during a rest period. Ten days later, gran was born.

My gran, mum, dad, aunt, my son and I took a train from Plymouth to London, then the Eurostar under the Channel Tunnel to Lille, where we stayed in a hotel. The next day we boarded a train to Armentieres and then a bus from there to Merville. I remember the bus journey to this day as the driving was eratic and we were veering all over the place. Scary!

When we arrived at the village we found a little French cafe where they dished up the best omelette I've ever tasted. Then we made our way to the edge of the town where the cemetery was situated. Gran was 83 and had arthritis but she managed to walk there. Being October, it was quite bitter but we were all wrapped up warm and someone had carried a little seat for gran to sit on when we arrived.

This photograph always seems so poignant to me, seeing my gran sat there with her thoughts after laying the wreath I'd bought from the Royal British Legion before we left England.


Phyllis Grace Geake (nee Weaver) by her father's grave
in Merville Communal Cemetery
Henry is buried in the shadow of the Great Cross, alongside the two other men who died in the same accident, Lance-Sergeant AW Mead and Private JS Litchfield. He's also commemorated on the War Memorial in his home village of Curry Rivel, Somerset, and his wife's town of Tavistock, Devon.


The grave of Henry James Weaver (3 Oct 1882 - 8 Sep 1916)
After we all signed the Visitor's Book, we made our way back to Lille and spent another day there before coming home. I was glad we managed to take gran to Merville and she went again with my brother some time after this. It was something she always wanted to do because I know she missed not growing up with a father. In fact, she was orphaned altogether before the age of 5 but, somewhat ironically, she was the one grandparent I had who spoke about her family, even though she had virtually no memories of them.

Please feel free to follow my Blog on Facebook

[Note: All content on the Hibbitt & Barnes Family History website and blog is copyrighted. Click here for conditions of use.]