A1-A2 King George and Bedford Lines
Introduction:
The founding group of this project that was started by the late Professor Michael Roy Burgess over 20 years ago. Y-DNA testing was very limited with only 12 marker tests available at the time. Twelve marker tests were woefully inadequate to determine relationships as there not enough resolution to rule out convergence. There were simply too many matches for the results to be meaningful. Michael eventually tested 111 markers but half of the project members never went beyond 37 markers which is the entry level Y-DNA test for genealogy today.
In 2023 the first Big Y tests were ordered. These tests confirmed that the Burgess lines of King George county, and that of Bedford county are indeed related. Three of the tests are from the King George line descended from 3 sons of Edward Senior (1699-1759). these 6 lines are all related.
Haplogroups:
William Burgess (1670-1712) of King George county, Virginia
1. Edward Sr. - Edward- William - Bedy - D.J. Burgess R-FTE3517
2. Edward Sr. - Moses - Edward- John A. - D.A Burgess R-FTE3517
3. Edward Sr. - Reuben - Thomas - King Hiram - J.D Burgess R-FTE4799
The descendant of the third son, Edward junior and the fourth son Moses tested positive for haplogroup R-FTE3517 while the descendant of the fifth son Reuben tested positive for a sub-branch R-FTE47999. We have another tester that also tested positive for R-FTE47999 which suggests that this NPE is also descended from Reuben. The time to most recent common ancestor (TMRCA) for R-FTE3517 would be 1699 CE which is the birth date of Edward Burgess Senior. The TMRCA for R-FTE4799 would be 1745 CE based on Reuben.
William Burgess (1721-1778) of Bedford county, Virginia - J.T. Burgess R-FTE16443
This line is related to the King George line but likely connects back in England. The other Big Y tester does not carry the Burgess name and it is unknown how he connects. We can only base the TMRCA on the estimate provided by FTDNA which for haplogroup R-FTE16443 would be between 1400 and 1850 CE. We would need another Burgess tester in this line to help refine these results by comparing against known common ancestor of this family. This would also help to narrow down the Wagner connection.
The parent haplogroup linking these 2 families would be back in England. Haplogroup R-FTE3233 is estimated to have arisen between 948 and 1491 CE with mean value of 1250 CE.
Project members: 32
Ancestral Families:
Research objectives:
1. Obtain Big Y test results for the other sons of Edward Sr., specifically the sons of William and Garner of the King George line. The haplogroup R-FTE3517 has 6 equivalent SNPs that could separate and distinguish them as has happened with the son Reuben. Further testing of the Reuben line through his son Thomas would be very interesting. We only have one Burgess result for haplogroup R-FTE4799 and there is more to learn about where this branch arose whether with Reuben or one of his descendants.
2. Obtain another BigY test for the Bedford line. Currently we only have one result with a Burgess surname, we would need another to separate the different branches of this family.
3. We have lost the Albemarle line in the project. The only member, who is related to the Bedford and King George lines has quit the project unexpectedly. We could use more information about this family.
3. Find a matching family in the UK or Ireland.