Two descendants of David Eagleton (1748-1828) have had their y-DNA tested. One descends from David's son, James (1794-1877); the other descends from David's son, Alexander (1788-1868). The good news -the two match. The results can be considered to be those of David Eagleton himself, since he was their Most Recent Common Ancestor (MRCA).

This leads to a shell-shocking conclusion that all serious Eagleton genealogists should pay attention to: The results confirm a surname switch.

David Eagleton's results confirm that in his patriline, he was part of the Petticrew or Pettigrew family. We don't know when or how the surname changed, but with numerous high resolution matches to the Petticrew/ Pettigrew family, that is the most likely possibility. Some might suggest that maybe the opposite happened: Petticrew is derived from Eagleton. There is enough diversity in the Petticrew results to suggest that their common ancestor lived perhaps a millenium ago. Yet, the MRCA between some of the Petticrew family & that of David Eagleton lived a mere 300, plus or minus, years ago.

The surname switch from Petticrew/ Pettigrew to Eagleton probably happened in David Eagleton's generation, or that of his father, or grandfather -perhaps at the time of immigration to America. This might explain why reasonably good evidence of David Eagleton's origins in Scotland or Northern Ireland have never been found.

Timothy Peterman
Kansas City, MO