7 Apr 2021

I’ve been using the DNA matches on Ancestry to look for people with Indigenous American ancestry that matches my 3% (which I assume comes from Joseph Ximenes). I’m looking for people with obvious spanish/mexican connections that I can try and connect. There are quite a few 4th or greater cousins that have no obvious connection with me but share DNA with some indigenous american component.

Today I came across the tree of AJ that contains people originally from Puerto Rico, some of whom migrated to eastern USA. I noticed a person called Aida Jimenez born in 1905. Her mother was Isabel Lopez y Montalvo b.1885 Porto Rico, d. 1934 Philadelphia, USA. She married Joseph Jimenez, b. 1880 although he is not linked as the father of Aida. There is an image of their marriage registration in Spanish which I’ve tried to summarize:

Marriage at Mayagüez, Puerto Rico on 31 Jan 1900 of Jose Jimenez, son of Manuel Jimenez and Leocadia Hernandez, and Isabel Lopez, daughter of Juan Lopez and Maria Montalvo¹

I think the witnesses were Marco Hernandez and Francisco Manet. The record indicates that Joseph was born in 1880 but I can’t see where that information is written in the original.

This is far too late to be my ancestor Joseph, but Manuel Jimenez could be the right age to be his brother or a cousin. According to Ashley Jordan’s tree Manuel was born in 1835 and died in 1914

Unfortunately civil registration in Puerto Rico only began in 1885 so anything earlier is only in the local parish records.

On the off chance of striking lucky I searched for the death of Francisco Jimenez between 1885 and 1905 in Puerto Rico. Joseph was born around 1840 so his father is likely to have been born between 1800 and 1820. There were 78 Franciscos but only 5 born before 1820:

Of course my ancestor Francisco could have died long before 1885 so would not appear here.

I copied AJ’s Joseph and Manuel Jimenez records to my Ximenes ancestry tree to explore further.