When Opting for Simplicity Causes Grief But Leads To New Discoveries

My story really isn't that uncommon than that of a lot of people in world. My last name comes from my paternal grandmother's husband and not my biological grandfather.  So the story goes that my paternal grandmother, Cordelia married and divorced her husband Willie Felton.  They had one child, my Uncle Clarence.  Shortly after my uncle was born, my grandmother divorced her husband and with child in tow, moved to the Hampton Roads area in Virginia.  She was employed by a Jewish family as domestic servant.  Later on she became an assistant to a leading orthopedic surgeon in the area.  She tended to patients and often wrapped their broken and fractured limbs in a cast.
Eventually my grandmother was introduced to my biological grandfather, Dennie, through her cousin Martel.  The relationship produced a son, my father. My grandmother was set to marry my grandfather, but because he had an ill-temper and was a highly jealous man, she decided at the last minute not to marry him.  When my father was born, she opted for simplicity instead of the truth.  She kept her married named and since my uncle bore this name, my father would also.  She probably didn't want the judgement that came with being divorced and having a child out of wedlock.  So simplicity it was.

Fast forward to the age of genetic genealogy and grandma's decision is wreaking havoc.  I would come across people in public and on social media who would see my last name and wondered if there was a kinship.  I'd have to go through the pain of explaining I was not biologically or genetically a Felton and that it was the name of some man I had never met.  Within my genealogy circle it was extremely frustrating because my counterparts were looking for answers regarding their own Felton lineage and I didn't have any for them.  The only thing I could tell them was that my paternal grandmother's husband was from Bertie County.  Some understood but others didn't.  I really didn't want to waste time researching a branch of my tree in which I didn't feel any personal connection, even though I was born with this last name.  I felt bad because my uncle was certainly a Felton and his sons were Feltons, but they couldn't care less about family history, so I wasn't compelled to trace the Feltons back more than 3 generations starting with my uncle.

As the years went by I started to see DNA matches who either listed the surname Felton on their profile or it was the relative's last name.  I started to think what if I AM a genetic Felton. What if there was a genetic connection through my paternal grandmother?  What if she and her ex-husband were distant cousins?  So like a good researcher I started to dig.  It didn't help that my genetic matches on AncestryDNA and 23andme didn't have a tree or they had very weak trees.  I had nothing to tie our connections.  As I researched, I kept coming up short.  I couldn't find anything that would tie my grandmother and her ex-husband together other than their birth location. So I figured the connection was too far back to find and that slavery was more than likely the culprit for the connection as well as why I couldn't find the connection.  I decided that it would be an unsolvable mystery until it got solved...if ever it got solved.

Most of 2015 has been dedicated to researching my paternal grandfather's maternal line.  It's slightly easier to research those lines because his mother was a descendant of FPOC's.  I've written a few blog post to date regarding the FPOC's on his maternal line.  As I was researching and adding various members to my Small line, I found a marriage record for a Small cousin and a Felton.  I really couldn't believe it!  Although these were Feltons from Perquimans County, North Carolina and not Bertie County, North Carolina, the proximity wasn't far at all.  After I had added enough cousins to my Small - Felton line, I went back to AncestryDNA and searched for Feltons in my match list hoping that their trees would bear fruit.  Again, nothing but weak trees or nothing at all.  Luckily I was able to add a few generations of Feltons on my Small line and saw a name that matched one of the weak trees that I had come across.  AncestryDNA had predicted that this person was a 4th cousin.  After carefully reviewing my tree and the matches tree, I was confident in our connection and the evidence.  My DNA match was actually a 4th cousin twice removed!  So the question begs, could my uncle be related to these Perquimans County Feltons? So far the paper trail hasn't proved it.  I'm not sure if I could get my uncle or any of his sons to test, but I think it would be the only way to find out if it were true.

Although my grandmother's decision may have caused me a little grief, I can say it unlocked a few doors and solved the mystery of how these Felton DNA matches are related to me.  Never in a million years would I have thought to look at my father's paternal line.  Most people have to trace a particular line back several generations to get answers.  I had to do the opposite.  I had to move the line forward to find the answers.  It just goes to show that you have to keep researching and turn over every rock and to expect the unexpected.