CFA ANNUAL MEETING
SEPTEMBER 16-18, 2004

This is the last reminder of the 2004 Annual Meeting being held at The Comfort Inn on 4200 S. Noland Rd., Independence, MO 64055. If you havenít made your reservations yet it isnít too late you have until August 16. Just call: 800-4-CHOICE or 816-373-8856, Fax: 816-373-3312. The room rate is only $59.99 per night plus tax. We are looking forward to seeing all of you there if you can make it.

There's so much to see and do in Independence. From unique shops to thirteen heritage sites that paved the future of our country, it's all here in a great hometown atmosphere. Independence is a place where great leaders made important decisions that shaped our lives. It's a place for fun where you an experience terrific shopping, wonderful restaurants, and a variety of exciting attractions.

All this and more are found in Independence, the home of President Harry S. Truman, pioneers and long-ago entrepreneurs. Here is a sampling of the events in Independence while we will be there.

16th - An Evening Swales Walk

Investigate swales, made by animals and wagons bound for Santa Fe in the
1830s, by the light of lanterns. Begins at NFTM and proceeds to Bingham.
7 pm
318 W. Pacific
$5 per person. Reservations required, limited to 15 participants.
816-325-7575

17th The Old Santa Fe Trail at The National Frontier Trails Museum

The Santa Fe Trail has captured the imagination of countless people. Join
staff for a special tour of the Santa Fe Trail exhibit that will highlight
artifacts related to this trail of commerce and emigration.
2 pm
318 W. Pacific
Museum admission
816-325-7575

17th
We Believe in America and Its Remarkable Freedom Trail
The Opening of America's Family Institute
816-252-9810 for details
City Theatre production
8 pm on 17 & 18; 2pm on 19
Sermon Center at Noland & Truman Rds.
$7 adults; $5 srs.
816-325-7367

Kansas City is perhaps best known for its steaks, barbecue and jazz. With more than 60 barbecue restaurants and numerous cook-off competitions, it is arguably the nation's barbecue capital. Kansas City became a hotbed of jazz shortly after World War I in the now-famous area around 18th & Vine. Jazz is undergoing a renaissance in Kansas City, a factor in the new Kansas City Jazz Museum, a complex that also includes a new Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. Kansas City has numerous activities happening during our stay.

Here are just a few:

Railroad Days 2004
Dates: September 17-19
Location: Depot Park, downtown Pleasant Hill, Mo.
Phone: (816) 540-3266
Working train collection displays, train memorabilia vendors, tours of caboose and 101 year old depot, street dance, car show, kid games, live entertainment, parade, cruise night, various raffles, art and craft booths, and plenty of good food.

"Strollin' Down the Boulevard"
Dates: Second Friday of each Month
Location: Business along Gregory Boulevard from Wornall to Oak, Kansas City,
Mo.
Phone: (816) 523-7434

Kansas City Renaissance Festival
Dates: September 4-October 17
Location: Renaissance Festival, I-70 to the Bonner Springs Exit, North on Highway 7 for 1 mile to 130th Street, Bonner Springs, Kan. Phone: (800) 373-0357

Re-enactment of the Signing of the United States Constitution
Dates: September 18
Location: Independence Square, Independence, Mo.
Phone: 816-252-9810
Americaís Family Foundation presents this historical re-enactment on
Independence Square

The Arabia Steamboat Museum features one of the largest collections of pre-Civil War era goods in the country. The steamboat originally sank to the bottom of the Missouri River in 1856. Over a century later, a portion of the ship and the majority of its 200 tons of cargo were recovered.

The J. C. Nichols Fountain located in Country Club Plaza which is considered one of the nation's most beautiful outdoor shopping and entertainment districts.

With all of the genealogical research sites there will be so much to do you
will be able to take back many memories of this great area of out country.
Officers:
President: Robert E Childers, 185 Columbia Drive, Waverly, OH 45690,
(bobfloch@adelphia.net)
Vice President: Anne Ruggiero, 8982 Baytowne Loop, Ft. Myers, FL 33908,
(ruggierodhsd@earthlink.net)
Secretary: Wanda Trott, 2806 Mulberry, Pasadena, TX 77502
Treasurer: Julia Childress, 10993 Clear/P.O. Box 302, Hamburg, MI 48139
(jcbc1258@aol.com)
Registrar: JoAnn Childers, 960 River Road, Woodruff, SC 29388,
(bcjac04@earthlink.net)
Newsletter: Martha Ferris, 71 Dorset B, Boca Raton, FL 33434,
(mkferris@bellsouth.net)

WEBSITE

We are getting more and more hits at our website
(www.childers-childress.com). There must be something pretty good there.
Check it out as soon as you can. The following is a list of the pages that
are on the website that you can read, research information, contact others,
or even post your own information:
* Home Page
* Association Information
* Family Events
* Family Information
* Bulletin Board
* Bible Records
* Gedcom Files
* Web Links
* News Letters
* Individual Histories
* Membership
* DNA Project

Gary Childress is the DNA Project director for Childers-Childress Family
Association and if you have any question or wish to take part in the project
please contact Gary at his email address: London2005@charter.net)

Lifetime Members
"Just a reminderî For those members who are age 80 or over, who have
paid their dues for the past ten years, "Life Membership" is available upon
request.

There is no charge for this and the newsletter will continue to be sent.
Please notify the Registrar, JoAnn R. Childers, 960 River Road, Woodruff, SC
29388 and a certificate will be sent to you. Our association appreciates
your support.

OBITUARIES

Happily we can report that no one has notified this reporter of any members
that have passed away lately. Remember, we can only report what has been
told to us. If you are aware of any deaths, please notify Anne Ruggiero,
8982 Baytowne Loop, Ft. Myers, FL 33908,email at
(ruggierodhsd@earthlink.net) or myself, Martha Ferris, 71 Dorset B, Boca
Raton, FL 33434 , email at (mkferris@bellsouth.net) so that all members of
our Association will be advised.

ìIN THE MAILBOXî

From Sue ComptonóThings to do in at the reunion.
Truman Library and grave; Truman home in Independence and the Matopma;
Archives
Some places of Interest: (1) The Arabia River Boat Museum; (2) Kansas City
is famous for fountains - Only Rome, Italy has more; (3) The Country Club
Plaza Shopping Center; (4) Union Stationónow a science center, 30 W.
Pershing Rd.; (5) Crown Center 2450 Grand Blvd; (6) Wm Rockhill Nelson
Gallery 5911 Main St.; with a fine collection of American and Oriental
Art.; (7) Elmwood Cemetery near Independence, Buried there is the outlaw
Frank James ashes and wife Annie Ralston James. (7) At Kearny MO-not far
from K.C. is the home of Jesse James and Jesse is buried in the cemetery
there.

From Betty Childress Moderno
Dawn & Jim Childress of Asheville, North Carolina are celebrated their 50th
Wedding Anniversary July 10-11, 2004 and there was a Childress family
reunion at Jellystone Park, Cherokee, NC July 10-11.

From Indiana Jack Childress RE: CHILDERS/CHILDRESS VETERANS
PROJECTó(injack1@aol.com)
I am compiling a complete listing of Childers/Childress veterans from ALL
WARS in an effort to honor in some small way all the kin that gave so much
to provide the freedoms we have today. Being July 4th, I can think of no
better day to begin this project. Those men that died in WW2 will be the
first to be posted, however finding those that went to war and returned will
require some help from all my kin and readers of these newsgroups. I also
have a questionnaire for all those WW2 vets I would like to collect to
present an oral family history. So if you have a Childers/Childress relative
that served in WW2 and you have a chance ask them please do. Or if they
would like to participate, just drop me a line and I'll sent the form. Or
if you have a family war story I would love to hear it and include it on the
new site. Please lend me a hand in this effort. It will benefit all now and
in the future to record these things. Over a thousand WW2 vets are dying
every day don't let this family history die with them.

WHAT RECORDS CAN THE RESEARCHER
EXPECT TO FIND IN KANSAS CITY??

Consider the following comments to be an "introduction" to the abundance
of records the genealogist can find in the Kansas City area. There are many
repositories here. Although the collections contain an abundance of material
of local interest, no geographical area is left untouched. The listings
below are not complete; our libraries, archives, and societies constantly
add materials.

1. BOOKS and JOURNALS: Our libraries have full shelves! Expect to find
genealogical reference material not only for metro Kansas City, but also for
almost any region you might think of, especially for those areas from which
families migrated to this area. Library catalogs are ONLINE for the Kansas
City Public Library, the Mid-Continent Library, and the Kansas City, Kansas
Public Library. Of special interest to persons outside the area is a very
large circulating collection of genealogical books at the Mid-Continent
Library, via Inter-Library Loan.

2. CITY DIRECTORIES and TELEPHONE BOOKS: The Kansas City Public Library has
City Directories since 1859, most of which are on microfilm although some
scattered volumes in book form are on open shelves. Kansas City metro area
phone books are on microfilm, 1899 to current, at the Kansas City Public
Library.

3. EARLY DEATH RECORDS and INDEXES: Two area libraries have death records
on microfilm for Kansas City, 1874-1909, with an index to 1915. (The records
themselves are very brief - name, race, date of death, place of birth
(state or country), place of death, age, marital status, cause of death,
name of physician.) On microfilm, the images are of poor quality, difficult
to read because of crowded and faded entries.

4. BIRTH and DEATH RECORDS after 1910: Beginning in 1910, both birth and
death records and certified statements relating to Missouri marriages and
dissolution of marriages are available at the state level. The fee has been
$10, but that is subject to change. The approximate date is required since
they are indexed only by date.

Bureau of Vital Records
930 Wildwood
P.O. Box 570
Jefferson City, MO 65102
Telephone: (573) 751-6400

CERTIFIED copies of most Kansas City birth and death records after 1910 are
also available at the Kansas City Health Department, if the date is known.
They are unindexed, except by date. I don't know the current charge,
probably the same as at the state's Bureau of Vital Records.

Kansas City Health Department
2400 Troost
Kansas City, MO
Telephone: (816) 512-6309

5. NEWSPAPERS: Until 1990, Kansas City had both a morning and evening
newspaper. The Kansas City "Times" began publishing in 1871, and the Kansas
City "Star" began its publication in 1880. Microfilm is available for
viewing at both the Kansas City Public Library and the Mid-Continent Library
in Independence which is also in Jackson County. Obituaries, death and
funeral notices were not duplicated. Nor do they appear in an organized
fashion until recent years. The earliest ones are brief, often only 3-4
lines (for which there was a charge), and were printed wherever there was
space. News-worthy deaths were reported as news items, not as obituaries.
After about 1915 or 1920, if the date of death is known, it is usually
possible to locate an obituary in one of the newspapers in about 30 to 45
minutes, checking each paper for about a week. Also available is microfilm
for the Kansas City "Post" for 1906-1928, the Kansas City "Journal" (a
magazine) for 1877-1942, and by various names, the "Journal of Commerce"
from 1857-1870. In addition, there were/are suburban newspapers as well.

6. CEMETERY RECORDS: Published records for cemeteries within Kansas City
include those for Elmwood Cemetery, Union Cemetery, Brookings Cemetery, and
more. The Clay County Archives in Liberty, Missouri, maintains a
computerized index for cemeteries in that county. The Kansas City, Kansas
Public Library has a collection of cemetery indexes for Wyandotte County.

7. MARRIAGE RECORDS: There are transcribed, published records of marriages
for some years for Jackson County and surrounding counties. They are located
at various libraries in the metropolitan area. The state's Bureau of Vital
Records can provide certified statements of marriage or dissolution of
marriage for those which have occurred in Missouri from July 1, 1948 to the
present. A certified copy of the actual license or decree can only be
obtained from the county Recorder or Circuit Clerk's office. For information
regarding marriages since 1948, it is necessary to contact the county's
Recorder of Deeds; for dissolutions, contact the county's Circuit Clerk.

8. CENSUS: The complete Federal Census for all states is available here at
both the National Archives Central Plains Region's Records Services Facility
in Kansas City and at the Mid-Continent Public Library's Genealogy
Department in Independence, Missouri. Both also have a large collection of
printed indexes of Federal Population Schedules for most of the states.
Specifically, the microfilm collection at Mid-Continent Library includes:
(1) U.S. Census Population Schedules for all states 1790-1930, including all
available slave schedules. (2) Soundex for 1880, 1900, and 1920 census and
for those states indexed for Soundex in 1910 and 1930. (3) 3 surviving rolls
and 2 rolls index for the 1890 census. (4) Descriptions of Census
Enumeration Districts 1830 1890, 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930. (5) Federal
Mortality Census Schedules 1850-1880 (formerly in the Custody of the DAR)
for states AZ, CO, DC, GA, KY, LA, TN. (6) Agricultural, Industrial &
Mortality Schedules for the state of Missouri -- 1850, 1860, 1870, 1880.

9. MILITARY: Assorted published records are available at area libraries.
The National Archives Central Plains Region has the usual federal records on
microfilm -- service, pension, and unit histories.

10. IMMIGRATION AND PASSENGER LISTS: We have an abundance of published
lists and microfilm, but they are time-consuming to research.

11. COUNTY RECORDS: In recent months, hundreds of rolls of microfilmed
county records have been added at the Genealogy and Local History Branch of
the Mid-Continent Library (Independence, Missouri) for CLAY and PLATTE
counties. Films have also been ordered for Jackson County, but shipment has
been delayed.

12. COURTHOUSES: Jackson County has two courthouses. The very early records
are at Independence; newer records are in the courthouse located in downtown
Kansas City. The Clay County Courthouse is at Liberty, MO. The Platte County
Courthouse is at Platte City, MO. The Wyandotte County Courthouse is at
Kansas City, Kansas.

REPOSITORIES: Even if you can't come to our area yourself, you need to
know what repositories are located here. The Genealogy & Local History
Branch of the Mid-Continent Library provides an extensive list you will want
to examine: (www.mcpl.lib.mo.us/branch/ge/libraries.pdf)

Learn what researchers can expect to find at the National Archives
Central Plains Region (Kansas City):
(www.archives.gov/facilities/mo/kansas_city.html)

Learn the HISTORY of the area: Kansas City, Missouri, extends beyond
Jackson County into Clay and Platte Counties which are north of the Missouri
river. And right "next door" is the smaller city of Kansas City, Kansas in
Wyandotte County with its very strong relationship with Kansas City,
Missouri, especially during the middle and late 1800s. This means there are
4 counties with 4 sets of records to investigate! You will want to learn
something of our area's history here at the Missouri/Kansas border. View my
brief survey of four counties: Jackson, Clay, and Platte in Missouri;
Wyandotte in Kansas: (Source:
freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gentutor/KC)

RESEARCHERS: You may want to hire a researcher to seek records for you
in the Kansas City area. Follow my links to locate persons who do
genealogical research for a fee. (Note: Although you may find my name on
these lists, I am not taking new clients at the present.)

Read "How to Hire a Professional" at the website of the Association of
Professional Genealogists. Locate regional professionals: Heartland
Chapter, Association of Professional Genealogists. Find a certified person:
Board for Certification of Genealogists. Watch for Mid-Continent Library's
updated list of area researchers.

Don't overlook the clues to your family's history right there in your
own home or by way of communication with other family members. Learn a bit
about gathering and organizing such material: Genealogy Tutor Tips.

Additional Internet Resources for the KC Area: Kansas City, Kansas City
History; Newspaper: The Kansas City Star; Postcards: Images of Kansas City;
"The Kansas City Magazine"; Greater KC Convention & Visitors Bureau -- with
many links; The Nelson-Atkins Art Museum; Art at Kansas City's Country Club
Plaza (includes pictorial tour); The Kansas City Zoo; The Hallmark Crown
Center

U.S. GenWeb sites
Missouri GenWeb County Links ; Clay County, MO Links; Jackson County, MO
Links; Platte County, MO links; Kansas GenWeb County Links; Wyandotte
County, KS Links;

U.S. County Directories -- They include links to maps, cities,
addresses, & much more. Missouri County Index; Clay County, MO; Jackson
County, MO; Platte County, MO; Kansas County Index; Wyandotte County, KS;

Historical Societies: Missouri Genealogical and Historical Societies;
State Historical Society of Missouri; Kansas State Historical Society; LDS
Family History Library and FamilySearch Research Helps; Online Catalog -
Includes listings of rental microfilm for counties; Research Outlines and
Worksheets, listed by state;

Maps: Missouri Census and County Formation Maps; Missouri County 1895
Maps; Kansas County 1895 Maps.

RememberóGenealogy + History + Geography = Enriched Heritage

(from the Editor) This is the beginning of an article on the DNA project
that we are undertaking. There will be more in the next newsletter about the
rest of the families of the study. This study is fascinating and shows the
various Childers/Childress families that have evolved and their connection
or not to one another. Gary Childress has researched and written this
article so look for the next issue of the CFA newsletter. For those of you
who cannot wait, you can find it on the Rootsweb website
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~jpcfamily/childress_dna_project.htm


THE ORIGIN OF THE CHILDRESS AND CHILDERS NAME
(Gary Childress (london2005@charter.net))

There was a 19th century study of the language of the Eastern half of
Yorkshire. The entirety of East Riding as well as the Eastern half of the
North Riding has vestiges of a different dialect from other parts of
Yorkshire including West Riding and the Western half of the North Riding.

According to YORKSHIRE FOLK-TALK 1, written in 1892 by the Rev. M.C.F.
Morris B.C.L., M.A, in Chapter II., GRAMMATICAL, "child becomes childer in
the plural", in the vernacular of Yorkshire as it does in some other
regions. Childer meant children and was widely used. This vernacular was
likely rooted in Middle English origins before 1600, and was in use even in
the late 19th century.

Dr. Morris says regarding the Northern counties in England, p. xix, "As
early as the latter part of the twelfth century we find a tendency in
northern writers to adopt the es as the genitive inflexion of feminine as
well as of masculine nouns." What that means is that by adding "es",
Childer (meaning Children) becomes genitive inflexion (possessive) as
Childeres (meaning Children's).

Therefore as applies to the word "children" in Yorkshire, "Mary and
Elizabeth Children of John their father" could have been written in Middle
English as "Mary and Elizabeth Childer of John their father". We can
translate a modern English phrase using that Medieval rule of grammar of
adding "es" for possessive as follows. "John's Children's names were Mary
and Elizabeth his daughters", might have been written in Middle English in
Yorkshire as "Johnes Childeres names were Mary and Elizabeth his daughters".

This was a regional dialect eventually overtaken by other regional
dialects. I speculate that it is possible that old dialect eventually got
embedded as a surname. The arcane Eastern Yorkshire dialect survived in a
few speakers as a regional artifact long enough to still be heard in
Yorkshire in 1892, the date of publication to the book by Dr. Morris that
studied this dialect. And Middle English plural Cildre still survives today
in Lancashire dialect as Childer.

The Oxford English Dictionary has about 2 or 3 pages dedicated to the
word "Children" that seems a likely candidate to be the root of the
Childress/Childer surnames. We know from the Oxford English dictionary the
following:
"Children" has been spelled in Britain as "Childres, Childir, Childiris,
Childru, Childre, Childer, Cidru, Cildra, Childere, Childur, Chylder,
Chyldren, Childrene, Chyldyr."

Importantly, in Britain there were regional preferences for spelling the
word for "children". How the word "children" was spelled and pronounced
indicated something about the region of origin of the person (or clerk)
using the spelling or pronunciation as follows:

* Southern England spelled children with the "N" in early literature.
Childrene, Chyldren

* The Midlands and North Midlands preferred the "R" sound.. Childer,
Childre... (which suggests that the origin of the Childress/Childers name
links to the Midlands) Northumbria, the northern most county bordering
Scotland, did not use the "R" but used "Childo, Cidas". Scotland spelled
children as "Chields" and often used the suffix "IS" to make words plural.

To put some dates to when these "children" spellings first occurred:
1. 975 Cildra appears in literature ("c" was pronounced "ch")
2. 1000 Cidru,
3. 1175 Childre
4. 1225 Childrene
5. 1300 Childir
6. 1525 "Childers children" (translated as "children's children")
7. 1549 Childir (in Scotland)
8. 1578 "Childiris children" (translated as "children's children") is
sung in a ballad.

There is a place-name, a village called Childer-Thorton (no "s") in
Cheshire, England. The web site
http://www.fhsc.org.uk/genuki/chs/childth.htm describes Childer-Thorton as
"a township in Eastham Parish, Wirral Hundred" (a peninsula that was a major
Viking settlement). "In 1933 the civil parish was extended to include part
of Hooton, and in 1950 Childer Thornton became part of Ellesmere Port civil
parish and included the hamlet of Thornton Heath. The population was 112 in
1801, 319 in 1851 and 685 in 1901." Childer-Thorton is adjacent to Liverpool
on the Irish Sea coast.

In bygone centuries this small community of "Childer" hypothetically
could have given its name to several local inhabitants with different and
unrelated DNA that could explain some of what we are seeing today with
multiple unrelated DNA patterns ("haplotypes"). Additionally, the use of
the words "Childer and Childeres" in a Yorkshire or Northern English dialect
to mean "children and children's" may also have spawned several families to
use it as a surname and the several families would not be related by DNA.

A DNA study is currently underway in an effort to shed more light on the
lineages using Childress/Childers or similar surnames. The most current
update can be obtained by e-mail from this administrator
(london2005@charter.net) upon request. The following editorial is the best
effort of the Childress-Childers DNA Project to combine DNA results with the
paper trail. It is a fluid study and is subject to interpretation.
Genetics is a science. Genealogy is an art.



DNA STUDY
(Gary Childress (london2005@charter.net))

Most participants in the DNA study are using the Family Tree DNA
laboratory's, Y-chromosome, 25 marker test. We are comparing the results of
each 25 marker test to others who have taken the test. When two people
match on all 25 markers, it is written as a 25/25 match. Mathematically, a
25/25 match means there is a:
1) 50% probability that the testing parties are related to a Most Recent
Common Ancestor or MRCA within the last 7 generations or 175 years, if each
generation were roughly 25 years.
2) 90% probability that the Most Recent Common Ancestor lived within the
last 23 generations, which could mean as long as 525 years ago.

Definitions:

HaploTYPES" are a DNA pattern. A haplotype is a distinctive test result
of numbers or "values". Most tests results in the Childress-Childers DNA
Project show 25 values though some taking the test have optioned for the
smaller 12 marker test. Two people who are genetically related with a MRCA,
a MOST RECENT COMMON ANCESTOR, by definition, have matching haplotypes, i.e.
a matching set of numbers give or take a few mutations. Haplotypes are most
useful in identifying if two parties DON'T share a common ancestor when 2
testing parties don't match each other. It is easiest for DNA to prove the
negative rather than affirm a positive relationship.

The DNA Study clusters matching HaploTYPE tests into various families
labeled as follows: EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND CHILDRESS FAMILY, CRAWFORD CO.
GEORGIA CHILDRES FAMILY, FREEMAN CRATUS CHILDERS FAMILY, JOSHUA CHILDRESS
FAMILY of PITTSYLVANIA, VIKING CHILDRESS/CHILDERS/CHILDEARS FAMILIES,
BARTHOLOMEW GORDON CHILDRESS FAMILY, LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS CHILDERS FAMILY,
HANCOCK COUNTY, GEORGIA CHILDERS FAMILY, And 2 families who are keeping
their results private.

Definition:

"HaploGROUP" are specific values on the Y-chromosome that are slow to mutate and are relatively stable for tens of thousands of years. These slow moving markers are used to track the broad movement of pre-historic populations predating surnames. "Haplogroups" contain large populations of millions of people that are NOT related with the same "recent" parentage or MRCA. Population geneticists are interested in tracking the movements of groups of humans over time scales of thousand and tens of thousands of years and are able to identify a Haplogroup population by its specific DNA marker. Haplogroups did at one time have a common ancestor but that ancestor would have pre-dated surnames tens of thousands of years ago. There are over 150 Haplogroups that have been identified and more will emerge. Our DNA Study clusters test results by their HaploGROUPS labeled as followed: HG1 "R1b" Celtic-Atlantic Modal, HG2 "I" Viking-Norwegian-Germanic HG3 "R1a" Eurasian Steppes-Slavic-Indian J2 Mediterranean-C. Asian-Jewish. Each separate DNA lineage has a story to tell. The DNA is silent as to when the surname was acquired and by what manner. Any child adopted into a Childress/Childers household would produce a lineage with the Childress/Childers surname, and with a different DNA haplotype pattern. But that is not the only explanation or even the best explanation. The DNA lineages possibly descend out of multitude of independent families each selecting the surname between the 13th and 15th centuries with some lineages dying off and some lineages still surviving.

HAPLOGROUP "HG1" or "R1b" or CELTIC or ATLANTIC MODAL HAPLOTYPE

The nomenclature for labeling haplogroups varies with scientific studies and has yet to be standardized. The Childress-Childers DNA Study combines two of seven nomenclatures so that the reader becomes familiar with 2 designations.

R1b is the most often used reference to this group. Haplogroup R1b is the most common haplogroup in European populations. It is believed to have expanded throughout Europe as humans re-colonized after the last glacial maximum 10-12 thousand years ago. This lineage is also the haplogroup containing the Atlantic Modal Haplotype. The Atlantic Modal Haplotype is found mostly on the Atlantic Coast of Europe and includes Celtic (Scottish, Welsh, Irish) origins. See a map atÖ 2

The members of R1b (HG1) are thought to be the descendants of the Paleolithic hunter-gatherers who arrived in Europe before the last Ice Age about 40,000 years ago (Aurignacian culture). That pattern is most common in Western Europe, but is also found in all other parts of Europe.

By definition all within a HaploGROUP are related by a common ancestor within the past 10,000 years or longer. Haplogroups contain large populations. Within the Haplogroups, are families, each with their own individual DNA pattern called a HaploTYPE. The DNA Study is trying to determine if there is a Most Recent Common Ancestor since the introduction of surnames 800 years ago in each family by studying their individual Haplotype DNA pattern.

So far there are 4 different "haploTYPE" families in the HG1 R1b
HaploGROUP. The 4 Haplotype families have been labeled as follows:
EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND CHILDRESS FAMILY, CRAWFORD CO. GEORGIA CHILDRES FAMILY, FREEMAN CRATUS CHILDERS FAMILY, and JOSHUA CHILDRESS FAMILY of PITTSYLVANIA.

The initial conclusion is that these 4 families arrived at their surnames independently of each other and not because they shared a Most Recent Common Ancestor. Using currently accepted mutation rates, the non-matching markers between these families are too many to have a Most Recent Common Ancestor.

It is not clear, however, if the mutation rates are different and faster for these families than is normally the case. The 2 families of EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND CHILDRESS FAMILY and CRAWFORD CO. GEORGIA CHILDRES FAMILY may yet be related by a Most Recent Common Ancestor if mutation rates were shown to be faster than anticipated or if more markers where tested and found to be matching. A new 37 marker upgrade test (an additional 12 markers are tested for those who have taken the 25 marker test) is available at FTDNA for $59 when ordered through our DNA study with a group discount or when ordered by a "returning" customer by signing in through the participants personal FYDNA web page, then "clicking" on "PRICING" at the top of the web page. If those additional 12 markers matched between the 2 families, it would offer more insight into whether these lines are related with a Most Recent Common Ancestor.

We have extensively researched the Edinburgh, Scotland Haplotype. It is my family's genealogy. The Edinburgh heritage may reflect a migration to Scotland from England and assimilation into the culture for perhaps a period of hundred years or so in the 17th and 18th Centuries. The story of this family is recounted in part in the gravestone of a Joel Childress who died in 1819 and makes reference to his Childress ancestors coming to America "in his own ship, with cargo, in 1745". The date 1745 coincides with the date of the earliest extant Virginia records for some of the Edinburgh, Scotland family's lineages.

The gravestone of Joel Childress the FATHER of Sarah Childress Polk (wife of President Polk) enshrined in stone the only known, terse reference to an ocean voyage in 1745. In 1819, the year the gravestone was carved, 74 years had passed since the crossing of the Atlantic, when the story was noted in stone. The children of the children of the children of those who crossed apparently thought the tale of the ocean voyage resonated enough to put something of that story on the tombstone of their father, Joel Childress, who himself was not even born until 30 years after the crossing of the Atlantic by his ancestors.

In 1745, the deliberate policy of Britain was to populate America with new immigrants. The new immigrants were intended to be a buffer between civilized English colonists and hostile Indians and French. 40 immigrants were killed by Indians for every Indian killed over disputed lands. One historian has called it a policy of genocide upon the immigrant.

Land promotions in the Colonies were advertised in Ulster, Northern Ireland from 1718 through about 1775 and targeted the Scots living in Ulster. During economic downturns, emigration increased and ships pressed into service left from all ports in the British Isles. In the 1740's, coinciding with the time of the Scottish Childress voyage in 1745, crop failures in Ireland spurred a major push to emigrate and there was a concerted effort by Virginian land promoters to bring new colonists to Virginia.

Against this backdrop, the Scottish Chidresses of 1745 came up with their alternative, buying their own ship. The Scottish Childress ship sailed from Wales according to the gravestone inscription. We are searching for the records of this ship's existence. We are looking at financing provided by Glasgow Guilds and Glasgow tobacco speculators who financed tobacco plantations in Virginia. We hypothesize that the families brought their professions and tools of their trade with them (a handcrafted wooden shaft of a cane dating from 1775 from this family measures 37.2 inches, a unit of Scottish measure called a Scottish Ell used to measure clothe. The length of the walking stick may have had something to do with the origin, a Scottish origin, of the lathe or of the training used to carve the cane 30 years after immigrating to Virginia). Also records indicate that the immigration of this family included elder members of the family who would have been the most veteran craftsmen of their trades. This was not a voyage for only the young men in their 20's. It was a voyage for the whole family. We speculate the family was small and that few were left behind.

There is a family in Edinburgh (Scottish Register Office & City Library) that in all likelihood links to the Childresses of the 1745 ship crossing to America, though we have found no complete paper trail. We postulate that the Scottish Childresses all descend out of the same patriarch back in Edinburgh.

The Edinburgh family's surname appears in the records spelled as "Childeris, Childers, and Childrey". (The "y" would likely have been
pronounced "th". For example, "Ye old shoppe" is actually pronounced "THEE old shoppe" not "YEEE old shoppe". The Childrey entry in the records may indicate that the clerk was trying to capture a sound similar to Childreth or some similar Scottish accent). We have not found any extant signatures for any members of the Edinburgh family.

A number of these Edinburgh family members are "Saddlers" and "Hammerman" (blacksmith) by trade (which entailed on one occasion
upholstering the church pews) and are "Burgesses" (including "Extraordinary Deacon to the Council") in the Saddlery and Hammerman Guilds. One family member is a "town officer" and another is "royal trumpeter" fundraising money from titled families for a theatrical venture. The patriarch of the Edinburgh family seems to be a George born, we estimate, about 1600-1610 and is the first of 5 Georges in the Edinburgh family.

The patriarch George has kin and descendants named Robert, James, John, George, Haerie, David, William and Neil in Edinburgh. The Edinburgh clan marries into families with the following surnames: Hadden, Handyside, Little, Gourlay, Burns, Muir, and Nicol/Nicolson. The Edinburgh family disappears completely from the records just before 1700. There are ten known children born to this Edinburgh family between 1671 and 1690 of which 3 die in infancy. However, there are no further entries on the lives of the seven surviving children as they became adults. The last record in Edinburgh is for a "Neil Childers" who died in 1700 with an entry next to his name..."poor". There was a famine in Scotland in the 1690's that decimated Scotland and may have had something to do with this family's disappearance from Edinburgh.

Circa 1650, the Scottish Childresses in Edinburgh had a patriarch, George, who appears to have had 2 sons. One son, Robert, stayed in Edinburgh until his death working as a Saddler. In 1668 a land ownership document is recorded for this family in Peebles 3, Scotland, 20 miles southwest of Edinburgh and about 50 miles from Dumfries, Galloway County, Scotland.

Records for the second son George Jr. are not extant after about 1660. We speculate he and his family migrated to the Glasgow/Galloway
County/Dumfries/Irish Sea area to facilitate the purchase of hides being imported from Ireland.

Galloway County and the Irish Sea coast were leather working areas. Shoemakers were prospering from the salaries of local coal miners who needed shoes. Leatherworkers were fitting out the tackle and riggings of sailing ships which were everywhere along the coast off loading American cargo onto ships destined for European ports. Much demanded leather goods, including saddles, were being exported to America from Glasgow. Cattle herds and tanneries thrived throughout coastal area on the Irish Sea. And new wealth was being amassed and spent in the colonial tobacco trade being run by Glasgow cartels financed in part by trade guilds.

Glasgow was a boom town built on American and Caribbean tobacco. Glasgow was rebuilding itself after a devastating fire, dredging its harbor to meet the shipping demands, opening up its guild memberships to replace dead members lost in the plagues sweeping port towns. Tobacco was a force for change. A few monopolistic cartels, some related by inter-marriage, were financing this highly profitable trade. The cash-flow strapped cartels turned to the craftsmen guild membership to borrow the funds needed to keep solvent the tobacco merchants who were buying, selling and financing transactions. There was an increasing middle class, a chance for upward mobility, and even a nouveau riche speculator class. Tobacco was bought and sold before it was grown or shipped.... a futures market. Fortunes were being made for those who would take risks which was in stark contrast to the poverty, the worst in the British Isles, of an agrarian Scotland. British fees and taxes on imported goods were rising which increased the incentives for the locals to smuggle. British custom officials were taking bribes. Welsh farmers worked part of the year on their crops and cattle herds and part of the year hiding, repackaging and transporting untaxed contraband. There was a flourishing black market trade and skillful deceit in avoiding tobacco tariffs. If the Scottish Childresses were hardworking, thrifty guild members, participating in the Glasgow boom, they likely were solicited for investment money by the tobacco cartels. And if the Scottish Childresses were savvy and street wise, the largest port in Wales, Swansea, had a senior British Customs authority who took bribes during very years the Childress ship would be in service. Things were in flux. One could enter the elite world of the tobacco cartels by marriage, by providing financing, or by owning a tobacco plantation.

In 1745, the Scottish Childresses sailed from Wales to buy farmland in Virginia for tobacco. We hypothesize that it was the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of these first Galloway-Irish Sea area leatherworking Childresses that migrated to Virginia circa 1745 in a ship that most likely was financed or inspired by tobacco speculators in Glasgow. Typically, a ship would be bought by a partnership and would make one round trip to America, returning with tobacco for the speculators. Upon their return the ship would be sold to another partnership.

We note that in Virginia some HG1 "R1b" Scottish Childresses are connected to cattle and leather trades. There is a John Childress Jr., born
1759, who serves in the Revolutionary War herding cattle in the army and whose father was a shoemaker. The Continental Army in the Revolution owes payment in Amherst/Albemarle Counties, VA for taking Childress cattle. There is a surname (Lindsay) into which the early HG1 "R1B" Scottish Childresses marry in Knox County, TN that has a tannery in Knoxville. Circa the late 1800's a directory of Richmond, VA. shows a Childress shoe business and by the 1900's there is a Childress family manufacturing shoes (Propst-Childress Shoe Co, Roanoke, VA). There are records of Childresses tanning leather, and operating a dairy (Montgomery County, VA). And in San Antonio, Texas around 1840 there surfaces a Childress family petitioning the US Government for a contract to manufacture Army saddles (Rice & Childress Saddles).

To date, there are only 3 members of these Scottish Childresses who have taken DNA tests. The most interesting test results come from comparing the DNA of Joseph W. A. Childress, of Goochland, VA to that of Dr. Joseph (Jay) Howard Childress of Knox County, TN. Their results match 21/25 and differ at 4 "hot spots". Hot spots are fast mutating sites on the Y-chromosome, that are currently being studied by the University of Arizona. It is not clear how fast they mutate or if the mutation rate varies among different surnames. Currently "hot spot" mutation rates have been estimated very loosely at 150 years per mutation, ie. a hot spot mutation represents the passage on average of 150 years to attain that one mutation on the 25 marker test. These estimates may change and my estimates are not stated as the mathematical probabilities that scientists quantify. Indeed, already studies have determined that each marker has its own mutation rate. An interpretation by Bennett Greenspan, President of Family Tree DNA, stated that it was his opinion that these two testing parties were related because their core stable markers were identical and that all the mismatches were at hot spots. An interpretation of how long it would take the DNA to mutate 4 times at hot spots suggests about 600 years. If that is correct then a common ancestor of these two testing parties might be expected circa 1400 or earlier. However, it is not yet clear who in this family Haplotype mutated at marker DYS (DNA Y-chromosome Site) number 390 which has both values 23 and 24 among the testing parties. It is possible that Joseph W. A. Childress, of Goochland, VA and Dr. Joseph (Jay) Howard Childress of Knox County, TN both mutated to 23 independently of each other which coincidentally conceals the mutation. If that is the case then they don't differ by 4 mutations at hot spots but by 6 mutations, 2 of which are concealed, which makes it a low probability that that many mutations happened since the introduction of surnames 550-750 years ago. It would be useful to get another cousin to test to determine which value at DYS 390, either 23 or 24 was the initial value and which parties have the mutation.

(to be continued in the Fall newsletter)

Sources:
1) http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/yks/misc/books/FolkTalk.htm
2) http://www.dnaheritage.com/masterclass2.asp and
http://www.roperld.com/YBiallelicHaplogroups.htm
3) http://www.touristnetuk.com/sc/BORDERS/towns/peebles.htm
4) http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~sczsteve/survey.htm
5) http://www.mbe.oupjournals.org/cgi/content/full/19/7/1008
6) http://www.ysearch.org/add_start.asp?uid=