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You are quite right and perhaps I was unclear. Yes, we can, to my knowledge, go back any number of generations and verify relations. However, I am not so certain how much DNA-Y or mitochondrial DNA results can 'disprove a negative'. In other words, I am not certain that I can "disprove" that person X (say, from Cecil Co., MD, c1660) cannot be related by virtue of distance. I know this sounds confusing (I am no expert in DNA), but, as it says at familytreedna.com: "A match or near-match with another person in our database, especially in the 25, 37 and 67 markers level, means that you and that person most likely shared a common ancestor within a genealogical time-frame."
My concern is distance, which you indicate -- quite correctly -- is valid for generations & generations...maybe 40, 50 or more. OK. But, my question is...is there a possibility that "no evidence of match" ends the relationship possibility, or are there other factors? One needs only to go to the OJ trial to see that 'contamination' and other concerns have an effect on perceived veracity. In short, I concur that, if a person has a match "hit" or only off several markers, that person is certainly kindred. My concern has been simply that several tests have indicated no matches for people who we should have had a match with, which brings in a whole new set of issues, such as, were these men allied with unrelated Alexanders...were they of other surnames & changed theirs...again, can we automatically eliminate them because we have no matches? And so forth. I am speaking here specifically about the Cecil County, MD and Mecklenburg Co, NC Alexander's, some of whom - not all - should be related and thus far we have no matches.
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