Genealogy Geekgirl: NZ DNA Detective

03/08/2025

🏔❤️ I have just spent a week in my fav place while I did an course offered by IGHR (DNA as Genealogical Evidence: Advanced Case Studies). It was in Eastern Time so much easier for me to be here, away from family, so I didn't disturb them. I have discovered that I am a education ju**ie! There's always another course or class that I want to do...

18/07/2025

04/07/2025

Dr George Frederick Bush earned a place in history by being one of Nelson's early doctors - and surgeon superintendent of the Lloyds, a ship voyage to NZ that featured unimaginable tragedy, with the death of 65 children. He was also my third great-grandfather.

Bush's family had considerable wealth. Born in Wick and Abson, Gloucester, his father was a maltster and brewer with 12 acres in Marshfield Rd, Wick, on which stood a house with an "entrance hall, 3 parlours, drawing room, 5 bedrooms with garrets", 2 malt houses and stores.

Prior to emigrating, George worked at Bath General Hospital as an apothecary and surgeon. He married his first cousin, Louisa Martin, living at 22 Rivers St in a magnificent (historically listed) Georgian home. He was recruited by the NZ Company for the Lloyds.

The ship sailed from Deptford in Sep 1841 with 75 women passengers and 133 children. George, Louisa and their daughter F***y were in the cabin. Immediately, they struck rough weather with passengers suffering much sickness and diahorrea. Just over a month into the voyage the Lloyds put in at Santiago, where 12 deaths were reported. By the time the ship reached the Cape of Good Hope, 60 had died, including Bush's infant daughter. In addition, Bush reported some of the female passengers were uncontrollable, many visiting the sailors "nightly".

When the ship arrived in Nelson, a board of inquiry found Bush accountable and withheld payment for his services.

He and Louisa had three sons after arrival, one stillborn. She too died in 1848.

In 1849, with two small sons, George married again, to Henrietta Alexander from Edinburgh. Originally hired as a governess, the inevitable happened. George and Henrietta (featured in a previous post) had five children, one of whom, Henrietta Alice Bush, became my second great-grandmother.

George had property in Waimea South and practised in Nelson. He built Bush's windmill in Trafalgar St, of which there is a replica at Founders Park. He died on 5 Dec 1863 and is buried at Hallowell Cemetery, Nelson.

Photo Source: Nelson Provincial Museum, Ref No. C3131. Likely year, c1860. With thanks also to Ian Hay-Campbell.

30/05/2025

The loss of ability to upload raw DNA to MyHeritage will be felt by genealogists who rely on it for the expanded matches it can sometimes provide. An example of the few ruining the benefits for the many 😢🧬

MyHeritage is apparently securing their DNA database in response to the FBI using it in the Idaho murder investigation.

14/05/2025

I hope you are all enjoying the season, wherever you are, spending time with family or relaxing and doing what you love to do. Here in NZ, it is autumn, a little rainy and the days are still quite warm. Winter isn't far away though! Genealogy detective-ing is busy 🔎📃.

𝐔𝐧𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰𝐧 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐞
Two cases have been solved since my last update. Judy contacted me regarding her mother's biological father. Her mother had passed away, but the family had always suspected the man she called Dad was not her biological father. The job was to determine who he might have been based upon the DNA tests of Judy's mother (taken before she passed at FamilyTreeDNA), Judy's and her brother's (at Ancestry). The case was solved and Judy's biological grandfather was identified. He was a showman and later a house painter and died in 1959.
Susan's was my next case. Her request was a little more specific. After the man she called Dad died, her mother told her her father was actually someone else. A name was provided. Was this man truly her father? Using Susan's DNA test results, I determined her mother's information was correct and provided her with, amongst other details, his WW1 service record, which contained a photo, her first clear look at him.

𝐔𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐝 𝐃𝐍𝐀 𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡
I recently worked with Phillipa from Geelong, Victoria. A very close, unknown relative had popped up on her DNA match list. Despite her efforts, she could not determine who this person was. My search took me back to WW2 in Scotland, where, as a young unmarried man, her father was stationed in the RAAF. You guessed it, she had a half-sibling. After much effort, I tracked her sibling and contact between Scotland and Australia was established. The family has been buzzing since they got the news.

𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐜 𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲/𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲
As per last time, these cases are still coming through, mainly from State Trustees Victoria (thank you guys!) If you are an estate lawyer or executor who might need my services, please get in touch. You may be surprised at what I can sleuth out.

𝐅𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐖𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐋𝐭𝐝
I have just been taken on by Family Wise Ltd, based in Wiltshire, UK, as their New Zealand-based researcher. Family Wise looks for the rightful heirs of those who die in UK intestate (without leaving a valid will). If the deceased’s nearest next of kin cannot be located, the estate is passed to the Crown to hold. By locating the estate on the “Bona Vacantia” list (the “ownerless goods” list), the team trace back the deceased’s family tree until the closest (in terms of relation) living ancestor(s) are found. My first case was a fantastic collaboration between the UK, the Netherlands, NZ and Australia - the decedent's case was published on 2 May and the team got to work, firstly in the Netherlands. Next came the newest team member, me in New Zealand. Finally, Australia. By 13 May, the heir to the estate had been contacted. His words: "What you guys do is such a wonderful thing … without your team of researchers, I may never have known she had died.” It's a great feeling knowing that we made a difference.

𝐀𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 (𝐂𝐚𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐞 𝐒𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐰𝐨𝐨𝐝)
I am currently working on some traditional genealogy research for the Beaton family through Cathie Sherwood, of Ancestor Discovery in Brisbane, QLD. Our client wants both sides of his family, maternal and paternal, researched back three to four generations. His paternal side, the Beatons, is now complete. A tale of adventure from Edinburgh (involving shipwreck) to Euroa, Victoria, Australia and a relative who lived into his nineties, long enough to remember Ned Kelly robbing the Euroa bank when interviewed by the local paper! I am now focusing on his mother's side, the Armstrong family, who have roots in Northern Ireland.

𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐘𝐨𝐫𝐤-𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐇𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧
I was contacted earlier this year by a New York-based historian who needed some NZ research undertaken, with a possible book in the works. It was a fun project. Look out for her testimonial coming soon.

𝐀𝐝𝐨𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐞/𝐃𝐍𝐀 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐡
I have two DNA clients on my waiting list at present. Please get in touch if you have DNA tested but hit a roadblock.

I love what I do! 🧬🤗.

24/04/2025

Today is ANZAC Day in Australia and NZ, a national day of remembrance for NZers and Australians who served and died in wars.

Victor Campbell "Vic" Falkner, born in Masterton, Wairarapa, was my grandfather. Working as a truck driver in Rua Roa, a father of one, Vic entered the NZ Army in April 1942 as a Private (Reg Nr: 573545) and was posted to 25 Battalion in Italy. In July 1944, he transferred to the NZ Engineers' 25 Field Company, with the rank of Sapper.

Vic trained at Maadi Camp in Egypt, served in Italy and then returned to Maadi Camp where he remained for the duration of the war. While away, his marriage fell apart. He arrived back in New Zealand on 13 April 1946. Vic courted a young widow, my grandmother, Betty (Wilton) Fothergill and they were married in June 1947 in Palmerston North. They farmed together in Palmerston North, then Waitotara.

Pa, as he was known to me, both fascinated and terrified me and my siblings as children. He would swear like a trooper at the farm dogs and get mad because invariably us 'townies' would do something wrong when trying to move the sheep, then count to ten in Egyptian, show us coins which he'd brought back from Egypt and sneak us oddfellow lollies, particularly after he gave up smoking.

Vic had three marriages (one much later in life), was a father to three and stepfather of two. He died in Wanganui in 1995 at the age of 75 and is buried at Aramoho Cemetery, Plot 53 Cremation Lawn C, H with my Nana, Betty. Today I remember his courage and thank him for his service. 🪖🌹Lest we forget.

Photo source: Private collection of Julie (Falkner) Earle, taken early 1940s, New Zealand.

11/04/2025

Mary Jane Field was my second great-grandmother. She was born in January 1872 in Borstal, near to Cookham Hill Farm. At the time Borstal was a village near Rochester, Kent. Her father was a plasterer's labourer (previously a dockyard labourer and briefly a Royal Navy seaman). She moved with her family to a hamlet named Chequers Street (now Lower Higham) about 1877, where her father was a night watchman, and she attended school.

Prior to marriage, Mary worked as a domestic servant for the Scutts family in Northfleet. She married widower John Theobald in 1894, at the age of twenty-two, in St Helen's Church, Cliffe at Hoo. John had four children from his first marriage. He and Mary added three daughters, their first-born being my great-grandmother, Mary Louisa "Louie" Theobald. Sadly, John died in 1901, at forty-seven, possibly as the result of a stroke. While two of her stepchildren were old enough to have left home, Mary had five children in her care.

Doing what any sensible woman of the time would do, in 1903, Mary married her brother-in-law, Henry Files, himself a widower after the death of his wife Lydia. Henry had three motherless children under the age of ten to support.

After their marriage, Mary and Henry, a builder's labourer, moved to Bexhill on Sea in Sussex and had three children together between 1906-1910. This brought Mary's biological children to six (but with stepchildren included, thirteen!). At its largest, the household in practice was about ten, with eight children living at home in 1911.

Mary and Henry moved again to Northfleet. Henry died in 1916, leaving Mary widowed again at forty-four. Her only biological son, Cecil, died at Stoke Park Colony (an institution) in 1919. Mary supported her daughter Lydia when she became pregnant out of wedlock, and in 1939 still shared a home with her grandchild as well as married youngest daughter Florence.

Mary Jane (Field) Files formerly Theobald died in 1941 at Northfleet. She is buried at Northfleet Cemetery, Kent, England. A grandson, John Crighton, was buried with her in 1962.

Photo source: The collection of Linda (Roberts) Simmons.

24/03/2025

I had a wonderful time at the Connections 2025 conference in Brisbane, representing APG Aus/NZ at our exhibitors desk, catching up with genie friends from around the globe and making new ones too. Some great speakers. Can't wait for the next one in Wellington in 2027!

Photo credits: David Ryan, Maggie Gaffney and others.

04/02/2025

I've just finished watching Netflix's true-crime drama The Breakthrough, which explores the second-largest criminal investigation in Swedish history — a 2004 double murder of a child and a woman in the southern city of Linköping. Despite eyewitness testimony and DNA evidence left at the scene, there was no clear motive or culprit. As a result, the case went cold and remained unsolved for over 16 years.
The show follows the lead investigator on his obsessive hunt for the killer, the victims' families' strength despite their grief, and his eventual partnership with genealogist Peter Sjölund, who cracked the case.
A great blend of genealogy/crime/drama.

02/02/2025

Last week I made a trip to the Auckland Repository of Archives NZ to photograph some miner's rights, deeds and court cases. It was a pleasure to get back into a library environment, to smell and touch history.
A reminder that I offer this service to other researchers in New Zealand and abroad.
Please get in touch for rates.