Most Recent Common Ancestor     To Jan 2004   Dna Summary Sep 04
 

In this space I hope to keep a report of progress. I welcome any suggestions and hypotheses of family history which might be tested by this project. In the section on families I have postulated some ideas on the origins of the names and where our ancestors were from, based on their distribution in the 1881 census; perhaps imaginative but we didn't all just appear out of the murky past with name tags, so try out your ideas and guesses on me, we may be able to test some of them. I hope to eventually find some Vignes and De Vignes in France to test our linkage with the Normans who stayed home in 1066. Also to help the descendants of early migrants to America to find their roots in Europe. 

This project was formed at beginning of February 2003. The first two participants, both Vines, have forwarded DNA samples to FTDNA at Houston, Texas for testing. 

10th Feb 2003 Fred Vines, NSW, Australia and Tim Vines, Louisiana, US, initiated the project by today.
18th Feb 2003  Joe Vines of Arkasas joined, descendant of migrants to America before the Revolution.
21st Feb Ron Vines of Melbourne, descendant of Vines from Bremhill, Nth Wiltshire who came to Australia in the 1850s  via New Zealand, arranging to join. 
23rd Feb Improved version of website running.
28th Arthur and Frank Vine of England, believed to be from a common ancestor in 1700s, ordered tests.
This will also give an early chance to test for a common origin for the Vines and Vine names.
29th Tim Vines (Louisiana) 12 marker results  and Fred Vines (OZ) 25 marker results were received. These indicated two different genetic lines.
30th Mar During last 2 weeks a mail out of 135 flyers to Vines in New South Wales and Victoria was made to disseminate notice of the project and inform of this website. 
1st Apr Joe Vines from Arkansas received his 25 marker results. Once again these showed another genetic line, now 3.
15th Apr Arthur and Frank Vine received results of their 25 marker tests. Not only did they match each other as distant cousins but match exactly with Fred, thus showing a common ancestor with the Grittenham Vines. See Results and Arthur.
20th Apr. Ed Vines from California joined the DNA project.
30th Apr. Results arrived for the first 12 markers from Rons test. They showed a perfect match with Fred, and the two Vine testees, Arthur and Frank. Results for the markers no.13 to 25 are pending. 
Several wills from the 1700s have been found for Grittenham Vines and show families; the males indicate potential ancestral sources for some of todays Vines. A tree has been developed and shown.
9th May. Ron Vines received second part of his Y chromosome test; this confirmed that he is from a common ancestor with Fred Vines, and Arthur and Frank Vine. See MRCA1
12 June. Results received for Ed Leroy Vines of California. They matched with Joe in Arkansas, but with a single mutation at Marker 449. They have a common ancestor in Thomas Vines, born 1778 in Nth Carolina who is thought to have possibly been fathered by a man named Lipsey, Lipseig, Lipzeig, Lipshitz, Lipps, or some variation thereof, possibly of Jewish decent according to stories passed down through the generations.Info from Joe.
26th June. Roger Hall Lipps joined the project on behalf of Joe Vines to test the long held rumour that the widow of Johannes Lips or his son remarried to a Vines in 1770s, and the children changed name to Vines at the same time.

20th August 03. The results for 25 markers DYS test for Roger Lipps were received and match with those for Joe and Ed Vines but with a mutation which helps to define the haplotypes of all three. See roger_ed_joe and haplotypes
It was also suggested by someone on the Genealogy-DNA mailing list who found he had a 12/12 match with Tim Vines in Louisiana that they might be derived from Fiennes and Tims surname may have occurred as a corruption of that. Tim has been advised. Until we have 25 marker tests on both we have no idea of whether this hypothesis is correct.

Over several months copies of many wills of Wiltshire Vines from the 1600s and 1700s were obtained, transcribed and put on the website. Being signed personally and dated they give us much reliable information on family members. 

3rd January 2004. Stanley Dean Vines of Alabama joined the project. His branch comes from the son of Benjamin Vines of Grittenham and a migration in 1846 to Michigan.