DNA Project for Fanny Petty Hagerdon – Success

I just posted not too long ago about the search for Fanny Petty Hagerdon’s parents and my attempt to use DNA to solve this mystery. I was pretty much immersed in this project for a couple of days, mapping out DNA matches and trying to connect all of them to the family tree. It was a big project!

This morning I think I finally found my answer. I had a DNA match who had traced her family to an Elizabeth Avery Petty and no further. This Elizabeth had married a Thomas Bennett. A quick search in Ancestry hints didn’t find any good information for Elizabeth, so I left that for a bit and moved on. This morning in the Ancestry hints there was an obituary hint for Elizabeth Avery Petty Bennett. As luck would have it, Elizabeth’s children listed her parents AND that she went to Green Bay Wisconsin with her SISTER Mrs Luther Hagerdon.

The other tie in is that Michael Petty has a will and pension documents where he lists Elizabeth and Thomas Bennett. I think this is the right family. I’ve had a lot of fun finds in my genealogy research, but I think this might be one of my favorites. We knew Fanny didn’t just appear out of nowhere and I think now we can finally tie her to her parents and family.