Reeves DNA Group 8 Update

My goodness, a lot of time has passed since I published these two posts:

Reeves DNA Group 8 Part 1

Reeves DNA Group 8 Part 2

Since then, two more Reeves men have completed the YDNA test and have been added to the Reeves DNA Project in Group 8.This is the Reeves line documented in James Rives Childs' book Reliques of the Rives. 

Also since those posts, three Group 8 research collaborators (Carolyn, Sharland, and Gerald) have completed the FtDNA Family Finder test. I (Carolyn) have completed the ancestryDNA autosomal test as well. All of us have identified  Reeves cousins through these tests, and a few mysteries have been solved. Our findings include:

• Two of us have DNA matches with a descendant of Elizabeth Reeves David. We suspected she was of our line, and now we’re certain even though we still don’t know which Reeves was her father.

• One match to a descendant of Drewry Reeves, born 1803 in South Carolina and died after 1880 in Wayne County, Tennessee. We know that his parents were John and Mary Reeves, both born in South Carolina, but we do not know how John connects to our line. Before the test, we could only speculate that this family was of our line; now we have evidence that they are.

• One match to a descendant of Drury Reeves, born about 1781, son of Jordan Reeves. Although we have an excellent paper trail for Drury, we don't have any of his descendants in the Reeves YDNA project. But now we have DNA confirmation that he is of our line.

• Several more matches to descendants of Jordan Reeves Jr – mostly mine since I descend from him.

• One match to a descendant of Harmon Bishop, brother of our ancestress, Hannah Bishop Rives, wife of Thomas Rives.

And many more. . .

Since all three of us descend from George Reeves and Mary Jordan, we are now collaborating in an effort to identify Mary Jordan’s mother through a combination of DNA matches and old-fashioned sleuthing.

So dear readers, I highly recommend autosomal testing. It will add a new dimension and direction to your research and help confirm work that you have already done. And, if you can’t find a male relative with the Reeves surname to do the YDNA test, you can still find Reeves cousins and confirm your line.

Reliques of the Rives tree on ancestry.com

Sharland, Carolyn, and Gerald, Reeves DNA Group 8 cousins and collaborators have launched a new tree on ancestry.com. The Reliques of the Rives Group 8 DNA tree contains the lines of all Reeves males who have tested as members of Group 8 in the Reeves DNA project.

There are two ways you can approach the tree:

1. You can start at the top with Robert Ryves, the earliest documented ancestor of this line, and click a son. Each Ryves/Rives/Reeves who is in the direct line of one of the Group 8 Reeves will have this picture of the Ryves crest attached to his profile.


As you navigate through the tree, clicking on sons with that picture will lead you to someone who has tested as Reeves DNA Group 8 through his YDNA.

2. Another approach is to start with the pedigree of someone at the bottom of the tree. Here is an example using the line of K M Reaves. In the pedigree, you will see the Reeves crest displayed for each male in his direct line.

Although there are currently eight members of Group 8 DNA, only seven lines are included in this tree as the line of the eighth person remains unknown. We have included wives and siblings whenever they are available.

We have added citations and comments to many people in the tree and will add more as time permits. We have also used the inferred DNA feature available on ancestry.com to display the Haplogroup, E1b1b1a1, on each Reeves male profile page.

Tombstone Tuesday - Peter M. Reeves

PETER M. REEVES

BORN
Oct. 19, 1810

DIED
April 4, 1882

Gone but not forgotten

Peter M. Reeves is buried in the Mt. Zion Church of Christ Cemetery in Richardsville, Warren County, Kentucky. The community is on a high ridge above the Barren River a few miles north of Bowling Green.

Peter was the son of George Reeves and Elizabeth Wilkerson whose families migrated from the Neuse River area of North Carolina to Kentucky. The Reeves came from the south side of the Neuse in Wake County and the Wilkersons were located on the north side in Granville County for many years before leaving for Fort Boonesborough in Madison County, Kentucky around 1800.

By 1820 George Reeves and his family had moved further west to Warren County along with the extended Wilkerson family. Peter remained in Warren County, married Sarah Hudnall in 1831 and raised his family there.

Decendants of Peter M. Reeves have participated in the Reeves DNA Project and been placed in DNA Group 6.

Reeves DNA Group 8 Part I

Reeves DNA Group 8 researchers Gerald, Carolyn, and Sharland have concluded that all participants in Reeves DNA Group 8 descend from Robert Ryves of Dorset b 1490. This conclusion is based on DNA test results and research findings.

In determining the pedigrees of our members, Group 8 researchers found we share as our common ancestor the father of George Rives b 1660, John Rives b 1667 and Timothy Rives b 1670 in Virginia. We now believe that their father was Timothy Rives b 1625, son of Timothy Rives b 1588, of the family documented by James Rives Childs in the well-known Rives genealogy book, Reliques of the Rives.

In Reliques of the Rives, J. Rives Childs originally, and we believe erroneously, speculated that their father was William Rives b 1636 Oxford, England, the alleged emigrant ancestor documented as #1, page 73 of 'Part II The Virginia Family of Rives'.

Childs changed his thinking about William's identity 28 years after Reliques was published. In 1957, he published "Amendments to Reliques of the Rives" in “The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography.” In the opening paragraphs, he states "The basis for the birth of William to Timothy Ryves and his wife of Oxford (pp.74-75) was the slightest..." Childs then cites evidence in the Charles City County Order Book for 1687-1695 that points to Timothy Rives b 1625 Oxford, England as the emigrant ancestor:

"I suggest now the likelihood that this Timothy "Rieve" or Rives was the emigrant ancestor and that he was identical with 206, Timothy Ryves, born 1625, son of Timothy and Mary Ryves of Oxford (p.51), and that he was the father of George, Robert, John and Timothy Rives of Virginia."

Given the evidence, we accept Childs' conclusion that Timothy b 1625 was the emigrant ancestor and the father of George, John, Robert, and Timothy. Timothy Rives b 1625 was the son of Timothy b 1588, #204, page 49 of Reliques, a son of Richard #3, a son of John #2, a son of Robert Ryves #1.

Timothy's son Robert died without male issue. However, Group 8 participants are descendants of the other three sons of Timothy b 1625. Six of our nine members descend from the oldest son, George Rives #2, two members descend from son John Rives #4, and one member descends from son Timothy Rives #5, page 77. The lines of Group 8 can be found at these links to Carolyn's trees at ancestry.com and rootsweb.com:

Timothy Rives in Rootsweb tree

Timothy Rives in Ancestry tree

The Reeves DNA Project Test Results page is here.

More information will be provided in Part II of this post.

In Pursuit of Castles and Crests

What is it about the concept of our ancestors having been titled nobility with castles and crests that appeals to us so much that it overrides our intellect? Modern Y-chromosome DNA testing is revolutionizing genealogy by confirming and/or contradicting previously held theories of relationships and lineages. Yet amazingly, countless online GEDCOMs and family trees are still filled with the incorrect assumptions of years past before DNA tests were performed on descendants from these family lines. A review of the first 5 pages of Google results searching for Robert Ryves of Dorset produced 10 sites that appear to be truly descended from Robert Ryves through the Rives family which is documented by DNA with 29 more sites purporting to be descendants through lineages which have proven to be of another Reeves lineage. Online Reeves' family lineages abound with such pedigrees which have been proven, over and over, to be incorrect.

Reportedly a coat of arms was conferred upon Robert Ryves, courtier of King Henry VIII, in the first few years of the 16th century. The ancestral home of that Ryves family was Damory Court in Blandford, Dorset of the United Kingdom.

Eleven years into the 21st century, do we not all understand the absoluteness of DNA - that Y-chromosome DNA is inherited by male descendants unchanged except for occasional random mutations which occur over many generations? Surely there can be no question that with fourteen different groups or lineages identified by the Reeves DNA Project plus countless other Reeves individuals whose DNA does not fall into any of those groups, that only ONE of those lineages can descend from the Reeves or Ryves family of Dorset. It is categorically impossible for the descendants of a Reeves/Rives/Ryves male who lived in the 16th century to include multiple different DNA haplogroups and combinations of markers.



If we do all understand the scientific conclusions of DNA testing, then the obvious question looms - why do all the copious and completely different Reeves' family lineages continue to list Robert Ryves of Dorset on their pedigrees and websites? Are they uninformed, unintelligent or just otherwise misguided? Maybe not. The continuation of the practice of multiple Reeves' families linking to Robert Ryves as their ancestor appears to be simply that the desire to be descended from royalty supersedes intelligence, scientific fact, historical documentation and everything else.

The majority of the immigrants to the new world were certainly not wealthy or titled. They came for a myriad of reasons - religious freedom, as indentured servants seeking a chance to prosper in this new world or simply out of a desire for adventure. Prisoners of the British government were transported to the colonies as punishment for their political differences such as Scottish prisoners after their loss at the battle of Culloden.

Ironically, three hundred years after the first successful English settlement at Jamestown was established, most of the great estates and much of the English aristocracy, who were land rich but cash poor and whose income dwindled every year were seeking wealthy American brides. In the early part of the 20th century, the fabulously rich daughters of American billionaires such as Consuelo Vanderbilt traveled to England looking for a title and married into the cash strapped aristocracy. In 1895 alone, nine American heiresses married members of the English aristocracy, and by the end of the century a quarter of the House of Lords had a transatlantic connection.

American genealogy would benefit greatly if the descendants of the early colonists could begin to embrace the bravery and spirit of their less than royal ancestors. It took great courage to make the dangerous journey and endure the generally perilous living conditions of colonial America which should be admired and celebrated. The fact that they survived and prospered may have far more merit than a crest or a castle.