Tracking My Mother’s Mother’s Mother’s…

Having tested my mitochondrial DNA (on FTDNA) to expand my mother’s lines, I am in the process of doing a RootsMagic database to track those families and add evidence.  As soon as my DNA results were posted in early 2014 I began occasionally to get contacted by people who match me.  One of the very first pointed me at Eunice Phelps and her ancestors, including a url for a family website that I believe took her line back to a Prentice woman.  Unfortunately that site is no longer available and the Wayback Machine doens’t have the pages I want to look at again.  Just this past October I received another email from a match and this kind woman reported that she traced my line back 6 additional generations, 5 in Connecticut (which also includes a Prentice) and the last in Buckinghamshire, England in 1603.  I haven’t confirmed any of this yet but am on the trail.

Starting with my mother’s mother, Bricena Snow Denman, I have only had about 3 or maybe 4 generations of women before her in my tree (and I don’t have most of the evidence for any of these).

Bricena’s mother was Mary Malvina Sweet, born in 1852 or maybe 1853 (her children reported two different birth years as I posted earlier.). While I have an exact date I have no solid evidence, e.g., from a registration of her birth or a family Bible.  Mary and Clemon Snow married in May 1880, in Lorain County, Ohio.   They had only two children surviving (given amount of time between there may have been others who did not survive although this wasn’t passed along in family lore).  My grandmother was the only female so the only one passing mitochondrial DNA on.

Mary Sweet’s mother was Brisena (or Bricena) Chadwick who was born in 1814 in Lee, Massachusetts and married Colvin Sweet in 1835 in Cuyahoga County, Ohio.  As a child one of my favorite family stories was that my grandmother was named after her grandmother who had been a twin (girls named Bricena and Chrisena).  That looks like a family myth since I (so far) find no evidence that there was twin (based on the Lee Vital Records to 1850 on the americanancestors.org site.  So much for stories.  Bricena and Colvin Sweet had somewhere around 10 children including 3 girls.  The first Mary died within a month of her birth.  The second, Bricena E. Sweet (known as Aunt Britie) never married (and had no children as far as I know).  and the second Mary was my great grandmother.  So she was (at least so far) the only one to pass on mitochondrial DNA.

Bricena Chadwick’s mother was Eunice Phelps, born in 1785 in Hebron, Connecticut one week after Hebron’s county changed from Windham county to Tolland county.  In 1805 she married Hemen (or Herman) Chadwick in Lee, Massachusetts and they had 5 children, only one a girl (Bricena).  Hemen Chadwick died young, in 1815 leaving Bricena a 30 year old widow.  If she had married again and had more children there would be other possibilities, however, I believe that she did not remarry until 1827 (when she was 41) and did not have more children.  So again, my great-great grandmother was the only female in her line passing along mitochondrial DNA.

This is the point at which my own research stopped until very recently.  I think Eunice’s mother was a Lucy Lord, born 1748, and married to Solomon Phelps, Jr. born 1743, both in Connecticut.  I am only beginning to research from here, so will just list the names I have been given by my recent match in October.  What she found, and I think is at least close to the earlier tree that isn’t online anymore, are these women:

Lucy Lord 1748 in Colchester
Lucy Bulkeley 1720 in Colchester
Patience Prentice 1680 New London
Sarah Jones 1654 Boston
Ann Griggs 1632 New London
Alice Sibtharp 1603 Buckinghamshire, England

So I have a “map” of sorts to guide me.  I am particularly interested in finding the families that had more than one female living to adulthood and having children of her own, since these could be my mitochondrial matches which don’t look at all familiar in family tree surnames at first glance.