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My dad got a lady pregnant in Korea while he was in the war. When he got back, he tried to move her here but was unable to. He lost touch with her. For years, I have tried to find him but there was no way until DNA. I got my DNA done through ancestry.com and he had not sent any DNA into there.

Last night I uploaded my raw DNA into GEDmatch.com and it became accessible this morning. I have NO IDEA what any of it means. I got some results but I don’t know what anything means. I did a one to one match with the guy who has 119 cM match. I’m going to try to include the one to one photo and the screen grab of all matches.

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    Hi Victoria, welcome. I am going to edit your post to remove the image with all the names and email addresses of your matches - they may not want this information public. Have you looked at the Beginner's guides on Gedmatch? Click on "Using GEDmatch" in the Learn More section on your Gedmatch home page.
    – Harry V.
    Nov 18, 2018 at 16:56
  • Haha Sorry about that. Thank you for removing that. Yes I saw it and I did read some but it looked so comprehensive and since I just wanted to find out one thing, I thought I might ask the one specific question to the forum and maybe someone could tell. Nov 18, 2018 at 18:00
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    Hi, Victoria, please note that your question is not on-topic for the site and may be closed. I have started a discussion here: genealogy.meta.stackexchange.com/q/3377/1006 For more information about how the site works, please read the materials in the help center, especially [genealogy.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic] and [genealogy.stackexchange.com/help/closed-questions].
    – Jan Murphy
    Nov 20, 2018 at 18:42

2 Answers 2

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Getting your DNA tested and uploading the data to GEDmatch.com were both great ideas for trying to find your half-brother. According to https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/28/world/asia/south-korea-adoptees-325kamra.html, there is a nonprofit organization called 325 Kamra whose web site is https://www.325kamra.org/. They say their mission is "to reunite Korean families separated by war, adoption, death and tragedy by DNA testing Korean adoptees, armed services personnel who served in Korea, and anyone of Korean descent to expand the worldwide database." Their FAQ page https://www.325kamra.org/faq mentions "if you are a Korean vet or a family member of a Korean vet you also can qualify for a free DNA kit".

You've already paid for your DNA test, so you don't need a free kit from them, but it sounds like they might be willing to help you if you contact them at the email address they list at https://www.325kamra.org/faq.

Now let's talk a bit about the DNA analysis. The only people whose DNA matches are relevant to finding your half-brother are (1) the DNA of your half-brother himself, (2) the DNA of your half-brother's children (your half-nieces/half-nephews) if any; and (3) the DNA of your half-brother's grandchildren (your half great-nieces/half great-nephews). I suppose there's a tiny chance that your half-brother could have great-grandchildren who have had DNA tests done, but since the Korean war started in 1950, making your half-brother at most 68 years old, it seems unlikely.

If you look at https://dnapainter.com/tools/sharedcmv3, you'll see that half-siblings nearly all share between 1317 and 2312 cM of DNA, with an average of 1783 cM. Half-niece/nephews share 500–1446 cM (average 891), and half great-nieces/half great-nephews share 125-765 cM (average 432).

All of that means if your half-brother or one of his children or even one of his grandchildren is on GEDmatch, they will very likely be your top match, aside from some close relatives who are presumably already known to you. As the other answer from Cyn notes, there is some small chance that the person with 119 cM could be the grandchild of your half-brother, but it seems small.

As Cyn notes, it's possible that the haplogroups listed for some people on GEDmatch could be useful. The one it labels "Mt" means mitochondrial DNA haplogroup, which is passed from mother to child; your half-brother would be expected to have an Mt haplogroup that occurs among Korean people. The one it labels "Y" is the Y chromosome, passed from father to son; your half-brother would be expected to have a Y haplogroup which occurs among people of your father's ancestry. If you have a brother who would do a DNA test, then your brother and half-brother would be expected to have the same Y haplogroup; the same would be true of a male first cousin of yours born to your father's brother, if any such people exist.

I have not done a search like yours, so I would be happy to defer to someone with greater knowledge, but my expectation is that any match for your half-brother or one of his descendants will be extremely obvious, right at the top of your one-to-many list on GEDmatch; or else the person/people you're looking for will not appear at all, because they do not have results on GEDmatch.

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This is not your brother or your nephew, because the total match is too small. It's a decent match though and that 73 cM segment is enormous.

A half sibling match is 1317-2312 cM. A half nephew match is 500-1446.

BUT...this could be a half great nephew as 119 cM is pretty close to the range of 125-765 cM.

The question I have for you is, how do you know this match is on your dad's side vs your mom's side? Have you been able to test either of your parents?

If you know this match comes from your dad's side, how do you know that he is part Korean? This info may be obvious to you but you did not include it in your question. The match's Y-DNA (J1-Z1884) is Italian or thereabouts. Do you know if that matches your dad's? The match's mtDNA is an H6, which is European, not Asian.

This may be a cousin of yours who is not part of the line of your half-brother in Korea. Or your brother could have left Korea and married a European woman.

We need more information to be able to help you out.

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    I'm not being rude. I just don't know anything else. Both of my parents are dead and I just uploaded this last night. My dad's family is very open but my mom's family did not approve of her marriage to my dad and never spoke to us. I am now estranged from my only sibling, my sister. Thank you so much for helping me. I now know that none of those ppl look like my brother. Nov 18, 2018 at 17:57
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    I'm so sorry if you think I was calling you rude. I had no way of knowing if you had more information you didn't share (because you probably don't know what is important, and some of your info was edited out due to privacy, though I found it in the edit history). My immediate advice to you is 1) contact this match via the email on Gedmatch. 2) See if anyone else from your mom's or dad's family has tested and try to triangulate the results with this match. Good luck!
    – Cyn
    Nov 18, 2018 at 18:07
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    Thanks so much. I'm not that interested in him. I just hoped he was my brother. I have a million cousins that showed up on ancestry. I'm not someone who really cares about genetic relatives that much. I just really feel bad that my dad wanted to meet his son and couldn't. He would have been a part of our lives. I really can't express how much I appreciate your help. Sincerely, Victoria. Nov 18, 2018 at 22:28
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    You're welcome. If you get more information, share it by editing your original post (then it will show up at the top of the "active" questions menu). I appreciate your kind words. Another good way to let people know their answers were helpful is to click the upward facing triangle to the left of their answers (upvoting). Good luck and keep sharing!
    – Cyn
    Nov 19, 2018 at 3:16

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