DNA links MILLEY families of Newfoundland to MOLLOY families of Ireland

The first results of the recently formed Milley Males Y-DNA Project are in and they clearly connect MILLEY and MOLLOY descendants whose earliest known families lived in three distinct geographic areas: MILLEY in Exploits, Newfoundland; MILLEY in Conception Bay North,Newfoundland; and MOLLOY in County Offaly, Ireland.

Preliminary results show these families shared a common male ancestor within the past 800 years. Further testing is currently underway on several of the initial MILLEY testers and these next results are expected to establish a more definitive timeline.  

What is not known yet is who that common male ancestor was. But these DNA results can focus any research on finding him in the right place. Results like this are especially helpful when records no longer exist, or to establish kinship among families who did not practice infant baptism (and therefore left no birth-type records).

This DNA evidence may help fill that gap in traditional, written sources of family history.

The MOLLOY surname is one of the oldest and most stable surnames in Ireland and is estimated to go back atleast 900 years.