The baby in the park: a genetic mystery solved?

[nwhyte]

Some names have been changed below; some have not.

As previously mentioned, I've been getting a lot of useful distraction from the Ancestry.com website of late. Back in December I reported that I'd had a call with a lady whose mother was found abandoned in a Philadelphia park as a three-week-old baby, in 1917. DNA suggests that she and her

Comments

[jeffreyab]

Interesting story.

How much do you know of Belgian records during the Napoleonic era?

I have an ancestor Jean Baptiste Dondale who was drafted into the French Army.
Captured in Spain
Hired in the King's Royal Rifle Corps.
Fought in New England maybe.
Discharged in Nova Scotia.
His daughter married into my male line.

Belgian data: Jean Baptiste Dudale, had a somewhat different biography. He was born 25 Dec. 1793 to a Walloon (francophone Catholic) family in Brussels,

[nwhyte]

It's all a bit hit and miss here. Though I would say that a Belgian born in 1793 is unlikely to have served in the Napoleonic wars, which ended when he was twelve!

[jeffreyab]

He would have been 18 in 1811 though. he has a convoluted history.

So "by the time he was eighteen, Jean Baptiste Dudale had been conscripted into Napoleon’s army. He served with French forces fighting in Spain, where he was eventually taken prisoner. Afterward finding refuge in England, he then enlisted and served in North America in H.M. 60th Regiment, 7th Battalion. He was discharged in Nova Scotia where he received land for his service. John Dondale married 22 March 1821 Elizabeth Ann Trimper, b. 19 Jan. 1793 daughter of Hessian soldier, John Trimper and his wife Else Milner (of Yorkshire descent). John Dondale died in West Dalhousie 9 Apr. 1843."

The 7th of the 60th was not raised until 1813. https://www.warof1812.ca/60th.htm

How hard are Brussels birth records of the time to find?