Using DNA and thrulines to breakdown brick walls- Paternal family

So when thrulines first came out I was like, no way. It's showing me folks as ancestors who aren't in my tree, I don't like this at all! Well, they have made changes and it's better, but still, I tend to completely ignore their "potential" ancestors because quite often, I find they are often based on really poorly researched trees. However, I have found a use for thrulines. That is taking my research, and my theories and testing them. And it works, I have gotten thrulines to multiple matches on most of the theories I have had, which were based on research and in common ancestry. So I want to take a little bit of time to share a few of the ancestry DNA shared matches who have proven valid with thrulines.


Hardy family, which has a lot of testers now. I noticed that everyone from Talulah Johnson that I had access to was matching descendants of Green Brantley and Mary Solomon. So I looked into it. Green Brantley was a neighbor of my family, living in the same section in the same county. My great grandmother had always said Talulah was illegitimate, and I assumed it was William Washington Johnson, but that's where I went wrong. See, Elizabeth is the same age as Matilda, who never shows up anywhere, yet is married to her sister's widower, John Diamond. Early census doesn't account for a third daughter, what if Matilda was Matilda Elizabeth. So I changed my tree, and made an unknown son of Green Brantley Talulah's father, and Matilda Elizabeth Johnson the mother. Bingo, we have a bounty of matches through thrulines from several children of Green Brantley. A few children are showing higher matches, but determining which one is her father, not possible, but we can safely assume, Talulah Johnson is the granddaughter of Green Brantley and Mary Solomon. A fellow researcher also changed her tree and has had the same results.

So another Hardy member, Gardner (I believe to be Gardner Sheppard after a great Uncle) Hardy. I know his guardian was Robert Kelley. I know Robert Kelley married a Rebecca. I know that George Washington Hardy in Coffee county is also matching my Hardy's and other Hardy folks in common. And we were matching Kelley's. I found a newspaper with the statement that Robert Hardy was not going to be responsible for the bills of his wife Rebecca who had abandoned him, about a month before he died. So, I changed Rebecca to also being the wife of Robert Kelley, and bingo, we have a lot of matches. It doesn't help that folks have the Kelley tree wrong, either. When you trace their records, Wentworth Webb and Rachel Sorter had a daughter, first name unknown who is the mother of Robert Kelley Jr. There is no indication that Rebecca is a Webb.

 In fact, DNA is linking two families to descendants of  Rebecca, but I can't find the connection, the descendants of the Bobo family and equally the Chambliss family. It's possible that the match is through Harriet, Gardner's wife, but based on the location and the time frame, it looks like Rebecca makes the most sense.