DNA Ancestry.com

Although my brother and various cousins had their DNA tested by Familytreedna, I couldn't resist a special by Ancestry.com that claimed it could get results from women AND link me up to other family trees available.  Since I already had a good idea of what my ancestry was, I decided to give it a try.

My ancestors came from Ireland, Scotland, Wales, England, France and Germany, so shouldn't I expect to have French, German, Celtic, British ancestry?  Other than the Eastern European, I was not surprised that I was 81% Scandinavian because all of my ancestors came from those parts of the countries settled by Vikings.

But, I have been very surprised at how well, ancestry.com has been able to give me leads on lines where I had hit brick walls.  For example, we had given up on trying to find where Louis Reiter was from in Germany.

His Civil War records said he was from Cassel, Germany and Carkert Co. Germany (the latter does not exist) and that was the best we could hope for.  Sure, his grandson Roy (my grandfather) used to insist he was not German but Swiss, but we always thought that was the anti-German sentiment of WWI talking.  For more on Louis Reiter, click here.

Imagine my surprise when ancestry matched me up with an individual with Reiter ancestors from Cassel/Kassel Germany.  I wrote the individual, told him of Grandpa's belief that he was Swiss, laughing it off.  He sent me a document about his ancestor which stunned me.  His Reiter family was originally from Switzerland.

A Reiter with a DNA match from Cassel Germany has ancestors from Switzerland!  I may never make the actual connection with this family---I suspect Louis might have been a nephew or cousin---but I have had to apologize to Grandpa Roy many times this past week.