Able seaman Alexander Arbuthnot (sailmaker's mate on HMS Pandora (1779)).
Comparatively recent developments in DNA sequencing (see [www.pandorawreckancestors.net]) have prompted renewed interest in a British sailor called Alexander Arbuthnot.
According to Admiralty records this man was recruited (i.e. ‘prest’) off or in Great Yarmouth by a press gang operating from HMS Richard (Adm. 36/11092) He was assigned –rated as an ‘AB”, able seaman- to the Pandora on 26 Oct 1790 and re-rated as a sail-maker’s mate on 1 Dec 1790.
Unfortunately relevant Admiralty records (Adm. 36/11136) give no details about his age or place/county of birth.
He was ‘D.D’ (“discharged dead”) from the Pandora’s muster on 29 Aug 1790 with 30 of his shipmates after the wreck of HMS Pandora (1791) on the Great Barrier Reef.
It is assumed this Alexander Arbuthnot was in his late teens or early/mid 20s when he died – his birth year would therefore fall between 1765-1774.
I am interested in tracing living male descendants of the men who died in the Pandora as DNA-Y sequences have recently become available for the three skeletons (nick-named ‘Tom, Dick & Harry’) that were recovered from the wreck during archaeological excavation of the Pandora wreck in the mid/late 1990s.
Alexander Arbuthnot is considered a promising person in terms of this ‘reverse genealogical’ research; in particular because of his responsibilities as sail-maker’s mate, i.e. he was possibly below-decks at the time of the wreck assisting other crew with desperate efforts to ”thrum” the vessel’s hull with sail cloth to slow down the ingress of water (ultimately to prevent the ship from sinking)
I look forward to hearing from genealogists who may have an Alexander Arbuthnot (b. vicinity Gt. Yarmouth?? between 1765-74) in their family tree – if so, the Pandora’s ‘Tom, Dick or Harry’ may be their ancestor (gr/gr/gr grandfather?) This could be proved by submitting to a simple Y-chromosome DNA test to test for a match with sequences from Tom, Dick & Harry.
Able seaman Alexander Arbuthnot (sailmaker's mate on HMS Pandora (1779)).
Comparatively recent developments in DNA sequencing (see [www.pandorawreckancestors.net]) have prompted renewed interest in a British sailor called Alexander Arbuthnot.
According to Admiralty records this man was recruited (i.e. ‘prest’) off or in Great Yarmouth by a press gang operating from HMS Richard (Adm. 36/11092) He was assigned –rated as an ‘AB”, able seaman- to the Pandora on 26 Oct 1790 and re-rated as a sail-maker’s mate on 1 Dec 1790.
Unfortunately relevant Admiralty records (Adm. 36/11136) give no details about his age or place/county of birth.
He was ‘D.D’ (“discharged dead”) from the Pandora’s muster on 29 Aug 1790 with 30 of his shipmates after the wreck of HMS Pandora (1791) on the Great Barrier Reef.
It is assumed this Alexander Arbuthnot was in his late teens or early/mid 20s when he died – his birth year would therefore fall between 1765-1774.
I am interested in tracing living male descendants of the men who died in the Pandora as DNA-Y sequences have recently become available for the three skeletons (nick-named ‘Tom, Dick & Harry’) that were recovered from the wreck during archaeological excavation of the Pandora wreck in the mid/late 1990s.
Alexander Arbuthnot is considered a promising person in terms of this ‘reverse genealogical’ research; in particular because of his responsibilities as sail-maker’s mate, i.e. he was possibly below-decks at the time of the wreck assisting other crew with desperate efforts to ”thrum” the vessel’s hull with sail cloth to slow down the ingress of water (ultimately to prevent the ship from sinking)
I look forward to hearing from genealogists who may have an Alexander Arbuthnot (b. vicinity Gt. Yarmouth?? between 1765-74) in their family tree – if so, the Pandora’s ‘Tom, Dick or Harry’ may be their ancestor (gr/gr/gr grandfather?) This could be proved by submitting to a simple Y-chromosome DNA test to test for a match with sequences from Tom, Dick & Harry.