Phenice DNA at AncestryDNA
Aunt Loris Bucklin Woolley (my mom’s sister) agreed to submit a saliva sample to AncestryDNA a few months ago. I had myself and my parents tested at 23andMe previous to that, but I wanted to spread my net to the pool of Ancestry.com testers. One of the first DNA matches that I noticed on her results was someone named Henry Oakley Spencer.
I had expected that match because I already knew that he had a good portion of matching DNA with my mom. I had interacted with him on Ancestry after noticing that his family tree had matching names of Daniel Phenice and Susan Jackson. Then he had taken a DNA test at AncestryDNA and uploaded his result to GEDmatch.com. He showed up as having more DNA in common with my mom than anybody else she matched DNA with. It was actually more than would be expected for 3rd cousins.
So the match to him was not a surprise. The surprise that I did find was a DNA match with the Quillen name. My great grandfather Harry Clifton Phenice (grandson of Daniel and Susan) had a sister named Emma Orra that was married to a Quillen, so I assumed that’s how we were related. And sure enough, I was right. This DNA match was the great granddaughter of Emma Phenice Quillen.
Circa 1920- Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice and Samuel Phenice with grandchildren (children of Emma Orra Phenice Quillen). On Cathrine’s lap is Harold, in the middle is Erma, and on Samuel’s lap is Dean.
Actually two Phenice 3rd cousins (to my generation) have tested there and are matches to Aunt Loris. But the best part is that one of them responded to my note to her and ended up sending me a photo of Harry Clifton Phenice’s parents Samuel Charles and Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice with some of their grandchildren!! I love getting new old photos of my ancestors. It’s an exciting reward to the research that I do.
So if you enjoy this photo, you can thank my third cousin Michelle Quillen.