by Stewart Blandón Traiman, MD
[This article was originally published in The California Nugget, Spring 2024 edition.]
In my son’s (J.T.) paternal lineage, there is a persistent mystery surrounding a third great-grandfather whose identity was thought to be unknowable. Ernest Richard Piatt, J.T.’s biological second-great-grandfather, was raised not knowing who his father was. Ernest’s mother, Campsidell Piatt, led an unconventional life and enjoyed entertaining men working in the southeastern Ohio oil fields. She never married and was a single parent to four children, each with an unknown father. Further complicating the situation, her children provided multiple fathers’ names on their vital records resulting in ancestral ambiguity.
This article explores the unraveling of Ernest Piatt’s obscured ancestry by analyzing autosomal DNA match data on Ancestry combined with genealogical research. Autosomal DNA (atDNA) refers to the genetic material present in chromosomes 1 to 22 in humans excluding the sex chromosomes (X and Y). atDNA offers insights into an individual’s ancestral roots, ethnic background, and potential familial connections across various generations. Our analysis of cousin matches in Ancestry led to a family of oil workers with four sons. One of those four men was Ernest Piatt’s biological father.
Campsidell Piatt’s Children
Ernest Piatt, the youngest of Campsidell’s children, was born on 11 January 1906 in Center Township, Monroe County, Ohio.[1] The birth registration names his parents as “Wm Piatt” and “Campsy Dixon” of Woodfield, Ohio. On 3 July 1926, Ernest married Bessie Lucas in Belmont County, Ohio.[2] Their marriage certificate names his parents as “Richard Piatt” and “Della Dixon.” Ernest died of liver cirrhosis at the age of 34 on 19 December 1940 in Wheeling, Ohio County, West Virginia.[3] His death certificate names his parents as “Richard Piatt of Ireland” and “Campsadella Piatt of Ohio,” with the informant being “C. E. Piatt,” also known as Clyde Earl Piatt, Ernest’s brother.
The records of Ernest’s three siblings fail to suggest an obvious father for Ernest.
Ernest’s brother, Charles Raymond Piatt, was born on 3 April 1902, but no birth registration was found in Monroe or Belmont Counties, Ohio.[4] A 1931 marriage record for Raymond Piatt and Dorotha Palmer does not give either of their parents’ names.[5] Raymond died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 36 on 26 January 1939.[6] His death certificate names his parents as “Richard Piatt of Ireland” and “Campsidella Piatt of Ohio,” with his brother Ernest Piatt as the informant.
Clyde Earl Piatt, born on 11 May 1897 in Perry Township, Monroe County, Ohio, filed a delayed birth certificate in 1942.[7] The document confirmed his father was “Forest Beaver,” an oil field worker, and his mother was Campsidell Piatt. There was a Forest Bever in the area who married the year after Clyde was born and became a Methodist minister.[8] Clyde married twice. His first marriage certificate in 1916 names his mother as “Campsidella Piatt,” but his father’s name is left blank.[9] The second certificate in 1952 names his parents as “Forest Piatt” and “Della Dixon.”[10] Clyde’s obituary names his parents as “William and Campsidell Dixon Piatt.”[11]
Lula Estella Piatt, the eldest of Campsidell’s children, was born on 4 January 1895, but no birth record has been located. She married three times, with consistent birth date information on those marriage records.[12] The first two marriage certificates do not name her father. Her mother is named as “Della Piatt” and “Piatt,” respectively. The third marriage record identifies her father as “William E. Piatt” and her mother as “Della Dixon.” Census records show her with the surnames of Griffith in 1900 (at age 5) and Piatt in 1910 (age 15), hinting at the possibility that her father may have been Charles W. Griffith.[13] Campsidell almost married Charles W. Griffith around 7 April 1894.[14] A marriage license, signed by both Campsidell and Charles’ fathers, was recorded but never returned. Lula was born nine months after this marriage didn’t happen.
The 1910 U.S. census adds a layer of complexity by reporting that the father of all four children was from Scotland, while Campsidell was recorded as a widow. These details conflict with other census enumerations.
Campsidell’s living granddaughter (Ernest’s daughter and J.T.’s great-grandmother), whose name is withheld for privacy, said the contradictory paternal names on her father’s, uncles’, and aunt’s certificates were fictitious.[15] Her father never knew who his father was, and he concocted names for appearance’s sake. Researching Ohio genealogical records has not found evidence of an Irish immigrant named Richard Piatt. There were several men named William Piatt in the area at the time, including Campsidell’s father, William P. Piatt.[16] No affirmative link can be made for any William to any of Campsidell’s children.
Campsidell frequently interchanged the surnames Piatt and Dixon. Her mother, Hannah Jane Ferrell, was previously married to Scott Dixon before marrying William Piatt, suggesting a potential source for Della’s adoption of the Dixon surname.[17]
Unraveling DNA – Leeds Method
Autosomal DNA emerged as the most promising tool to resolve the recorded contradictions and identify the elusive mystery man in this family’s history. The best available test-taker for this case was my son, J.T., Ernest’s second-great-grandson. Ernest’s living daughter (J.T.’s great-grandmother) would have been a better test-taker, but she refused repeated requests.
The first step for this task was to apply the Leeds Method to the DNA Matches list on Ancestry.[18] Dana Leeds developed a useful tool to organize and categorize DNA matches into associated family branches or clusters. We focused on cousins designated by Ancestry DNA as “Close Family” and “Extended Family,” along with their shared matches. Matches designated as “Distant Family” with 60 centimorgans or less were excluded as anchors for new groupings. A centimorgan (cM) is a unit used in genetics to measure how likely genetic material on a chromosome will be reshuffled during reproduction. One centimorgan equals a 1% chance of this reshuffling, called recombination, happening between two specific points on a chromosome. Through this process, we derived nine distinct clusters.
Prior research into J.T.’s biological paternal and maternal family lines proved invaluable in assigning some cousin matches to individuals already in our established family tree. This, in turn, allowed us to identify and align their clusters with specific great-grandparent lines. Others were identified by exploring both public linked and unlinked trees attached to their DNA profiles. Ancestry’s ThruLines® feature, which suggests common ancestors, also played a role in assigning DNA matches to their respective great-grandparent clusters. By methodically grouping as many DNA matches as possible and their shared matches, a subset of the sprawling 51,059 DNA cousins began to coalesce into comprehensible data.
The nine clusters consisted of 894 cousin matches (see Table 1). Group Nine emerged as an outlier, defying easy identification of a common ancestor. This cluster, with only six members, includes one individual who shares a connection with the Lynn Bayless McKeehan family line, suggesting that Cluster Nine likely represents a branch of that line. Although the Leeds Method recommends excluding matches with less than 90 centimorgans, this cousin anchor was situated above Ancestry’s “Distant Family” threshold. The inclusion of this cousin has not muddled the results. To safeguard the identities of living individuals, the names or usernames of DNA matches have been anonymized with cousin numbers. The cousin numbers are not sequential but represent that person’s position on a list of all Ancestry DNA matches as of October 2023.
Narrowing the Field
Cousin 08’s cluster emerged as the group directly linked to J.T.’s living great-grandmother, holding the potential key to unveiling the identity of Ernest’s mystery father. A deeper dive into the 38 matches associated with Cousin 08 offered hope. Employing the Leeds Method once more, we segregated this subset of 38 matches, along with their shared matches, into either paternal or maternal lines. Our focus centered on cousins related to Ernest Piatt or his forebears, excluding those connected to his spouse, Bessie Mae Lucas.
From this analysis, seven distinct subclusters surfaced. Among these, 16 cousins were aligned with the maternal Lucas lineage, while nineteen cousins were associated with Ernest’s Piatt line. In each case, we combined past research, examination of public linked and unlinked trees on Ancestry, AncestryDNA ThruLines®, shared DNA match lists, or new research to determine whether a cousin was related on the paternal or maternal side. Two cousins defied placement into either group, as they also displayed connections to other great-grandparent lines. They were excluded from further consideration.
A final round of elimination was executed for the nineteen cousins assigned to the Piatt line. Anyone related to Campsidell Piatt’s parents, William Piatt and Hannah Jane Ferrell, or their ancestors, was removed from further consideration. This action left only eleven DNA matches who were not linked to the Piatt or Ferrell lines, making them potential connections to Ernest’s mystery father (see Tables 2).
Nine DNA matches (M for Mystery Line) displayed no ties to the Piatt/Ferrell lines. The cluster shared surnames of Habay, Slate, Laughner, Grant, and Dorn. The next step involved constructing family trees for these nine cousins in the hope of identifying a common ancestor.
Cousins 64 and 150 (B for both) have special consideration. Cousin 64’s online tree places him as a direct descendant of Campsidell Piatt’s son Raymond. Cousin 150 also descends from Raymond Piatt and is the first cousin once removed from Cousin 64. These two descendants of Ernest’s brother share DNA with the mystery line. This surprising finding challenges the family’s belief that Campsidell’s four children had four different fathers.
Cousins 126, 241, and 268 have public linked trees or ThruLines® suggestions that indicated genetic descent from William Piatt and Hannah Jane Ferrell. Cousins 215, 252, and 321 cluster with Cousins 126, 241, and 268. Cousin 99 clusters with 321. These seven DNA matches (P for Piatt) tied to the Piatt/Ferrell line were consequently eliminated from further evaluation.
[1] “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” Birth records, v. 3-4, 1891-1908, registry entry for Earnest R Piatt (line 72); digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ-GRYW-SJY3 : accessed 11 October 2023), film 004017357, image 274 of 307 (unindexed).
[2] “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016,” Marriage records, 1803-1951, Ernest Piatt and Bessie Lucas, certificate no. 15345; digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XZ33-XLD : accessed 11 October 2023), film 004022807, image 242 of 349.
[3] Ohio County, West Virginia, death records, no. 1065, Earnest Piatt, 19 December 1940; digital images, West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History, “Vital Research Records Search Selection” (https://archive.wvculture.org/vrr/va_select.aspx : accessed 12 October 2023).
[4] Find a Grave (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/131361555/charles-raymond-piatt : viewed on 11 October 2023), mem. no. 131361555, Charles Raymond Piatt, 13 June 2014, by R/T/M/E; Raymond Piatt gravestone (Ebenezer Cemetery, Bethesda, Belmont County, Ohio), digital image, 14 June 2014, by R/T/M/E. And, “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” [Monroe County] Birth registers 1891-1903, vol. 3, negative search for Charles Raymond Piatt; digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1932106 : accessed 11 October 2023), film 004017357, image 133-140 of 192. And, “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” [Belmont County] Birth index 1867-1908 McAbee-Rheimenschneider, negative search for Charles Raymond Piatt; digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1932106 : accessed 11 October 2023), film 005871100, images 4750-4770 of 6652 (unindexed).
[5] Brooke, West Virginia, marriage records, p. 570, Raymond Piatt and Dortha Palmer, 5 December 1931; digital images, West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History, “Vital Research Records Search Selection” (https://archive.wvculture.org/vrr/va_select.aspx : accessed 11 October 2023).
[6] Belmont County, Ohio, death certificate, file no. 6716, Charles Raymond Piatt, 26 January 1939; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio Deaths, 1908-1953” (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XZ2L-TMT : accessed 11 October 2023) film no. 004122482, image 812 of 3300.
[7] “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” Delayed births with index, 1942, vol. 3, delayed birth registration for Clyde Earl Piatt, case no. 690; digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q238-LKWJ : accessed 11 October 2023), film 004022882, images 167-168 of 203.
[8] Harrison, Ohio, marriage record, p. 367, Forest R. Bever and Ines Ferrell, 19 April 1898; digital images, Ancestry, “Ohio, U.S., County Marriage Records, 1774-1993” (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/61378/ : accessed 21 December 2023) > Harrison > 1868-1906, image 406 of 704. And, Find a Grave (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/78869313/forest-r-bever : viewed on 11 October 2023), mem no. 78869313, Rev Forest R Bever, 21 October 2011, by Rusty; Bever (Inez P and Forest R) gravestone (Linwood Cemetery, Blaine, Belmont County, Ohio), digital image, 21 October 2011, by Rusty.
[9] Belmont County, Ohio, marriage license and certificate, no. 9173, Clyde E. Piatt and Tillie E. Diegmiller, 2 February 1916; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Z8M6-4FN2 : accessed 11 October 2023), film no. 004017155, 193 of 339.
[10] Franklin County, Ohio, certified abstract of marriage, state file no. 45587, Clyde E Piatt and Kathryn E Rowland, 7 October 1952; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:KDMD-V4F : accessed 11 October 2023), film no. 005262313, 1744 of 3176.
[11] “Clyde Piatt, 61, of Apple Creek,” obituary, Barnesville Enterprise (Barnesville, Ohio), 7 August 1958, p. 2, col. 3; Rutherford B. Hayes Ohio Obituary Index (https://rbhayes.org : accessed 6 August 2017).
[12] Belmont, Ohio, marriage license and certificate, no. 9038, Lloyd S. Gregg and Lulu E. Piatt, 23 October 1915; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XDKG-XN9 : accessed 14 October 2023) film no. 004017155, 159 of 339. And, Franklin, Ohio, marriage license and certificate, no. 88497, Joel L. Roberts and Lula Gregg, 10 August 1929; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X8VQ-XN1 : accessed 11 October 2023), film no. 004017598, 214 of 458. And, Licking, Ohio, marriage license and certificate, no. 20943, Charles L. Ault and Lula E Gregg Roberts, 16 June 1947; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:K3L1-WNW : accessed 11 October 2023), film no. 004640643, 24 of 76.
[13] 1900 U.S. census, Monroe, Ohio, pop. sch., Green Township, ED 0094, p. 2, lines 89-92, dwell. 34, Hannah Piatt household; digital images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7602/ : accessed 11 October 2023); NARA microfilm T623, roll 1305. And, 1910 U.S. census, Belmont, Ohio, pop. sch., Goshen Township, ED 0006, p. 12a, lines 6-10, dwell. 271, Della Piatt household; digital images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7884 : accessed 11 October 2023); NARA microfilm T624, roll 1156; FHL Film: 1375169.
[14] Monroe, Ohio, marriage license, p. 272, Chas. M. Griffith and Camadel Piatt, 7 April 1894; digital images, FamilySearch, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2016” (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XZCL-D2D : accessed 11 October 2023), film no. 004259978, 182 of 323.
[15] Living Great-Grandmother [name withheld for privacy] (San Diego County, CA), interviews by Stewart Blandón Traiman, 2014-2018; privately held author’s notes, Alameda County, CA.
[16] “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” Birth records v. 1-2 1867-1891, registry entry for Campsidell Piatt (line 162); digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X6JF-Q7S : accessed 11 October 2023), film 004009699, image 182 of 256.
[17] “Ohio, County Births, 1841-2003,” FamilySearch, registry entry for Campsidell Piatt (line 162). And, “United States Remarried Widows Index to Pension Applications, 1887-1942,” Hannah J Piatt in entry for Scott Dixon, 1901, no. 83791; digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:K698-6XM : accessed 14 October 2023), film 005240858, image 902 of 923.
[18] Dana Leeds, The Leeds Method (https://danaleeds.com/the-leeds-method/ : accessed 14 October 2023), “A Step-by-Step Guide to Getting Started with the Leeds Method”
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