Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2010 09:52:43 -0230 (NDT)
From: David Pike 
To: pike-dna@rootsweb.com
Subject: Haplogroup T and Todber, Dorset



Hi everybody.

Several weeks ago the Family Tree DNA lab reported the 37-marker results 
for kit 184460, a brother of Laurel Dancoe.

The first thing that was apparent when we got the results were that 
Laurel's brother didn't have any matches within our project.  Based on 
just the initial 12 markers, the nearest Pike match is 6 differences away. 
At 37 markers, the nearest Pike is 32 differences away.

These genetic distances are quite large, and clearly indicate that 
Laurel's Pike ancestors have a genetic profile that is very distinct from 
any other that we had previously encountered.  When Family Tree DNA 
reported its haplogroup prediction a few days later, we were told that 
Laurel's brother belongs to Y-DNA Haplogroup T.

The vast majority of the members of our project belong to one of three 
haplogroups (namely haplogroups I, R1a and R1b) although we have also 
encountered some other haplogroups with lesser frequency (namely E1b1a, G, 
J1, J2 and recently also haplogroup Q).  So this is the first time that 
we've witnessed a Pike in haplogroup T.

Haplogroup T is interesting for several reasons.  For starters, it is 
somewhat rare, to the point where it wasn't actually given a name (ie, T) 
until about 2008.  Before then it was thought to be part of haplogroup K, 
which is also somewhat rare.  There is a page at Wikipedia with some 
additional information about haplogroup T: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_T_%28Y-DNA%29

Getting back to Laurel's Pike ancestors, we know that they once resided in 
the villages of Todber and Stour Provost in Dorset, where Laurel's great 
grandfather Wyndham Pike was born in 1864.  A new pushpin for Todber has 
now been inserted into our map at 
http://www.math.mun.ca/~dapike/family_history/pike/DNA/index.php?content=results.html#Map 
to reflect that the Pike family there is now represented in our project.

Anybody who has access to UK census records can tell that the area 
surrounding Stour Provost has been home to a large number of Pikes, 
although until now we had none of these Pikes in our DNA project.  Now 
that we do, we can say with confidence that the county of Dorset has had 
at least three unrelated Pike families:  Laurel's family from Todber and 
Stour Provost, the Pike family from the villages of Pimperne and Shapwick 
(this is our project's "Group 13") and the Pike family that lived at Poole 
in the 1700s (this family, which is our project's "Group 2", is now 
represented by Pikes living in Newfoundland).  For those not familiar with 
the area, Todber is only 13 miles northwest of Pimperne, which itself is 
only 16 miles northwest of Poole.

A number of other Pike families are known to have lived not far away, at 
places such as Morden, Wareham, Worth Matravers and Christchurch in Dorset 
as well as Ringwood in Hampshire [historically Christchurch was in 
Hampshire, but changes in county boundaries in 1974 put Christchurch into 
Dorset].  Historical records (that is, those of which I am aware) do not 
indicate whether any of these Pike families are related to each other or 
to those from Stour Provost, Pimperne and Poole, but hopefully in time we 
will be able to refer to DNA results to help determine which families are 
related.

- David.