DNA Reveals What Happened to Her Father After the War | DNA Family Secrets

Many of us have questions about who we really are.  It feels like a mystery that we’re trying to solve.  There’s a part of me missing.  Night and day questioning who am I?  Wouldn’t it be amazing at my age to find out? Now, amazing advances in DNA technology means questions can be answered for the very first time.

 So, with any luck, somebody will have taken a DNA test.  A wrong was done to her. It is my duty to make right what she couldn’t.  This is the perfect time for the secret to end. Working with leads in geneticists and genealogologists, we’re going to help people unlock lifechanging secrets. So DNA is really the only way that we can go  through the power of a DNA test.

 The things you can do now.  Our DNA doesn’t lie.  So we have your results back. But are we ready for the truth? Liverpool has one of the oldest Chinese communities in Europe. 78-year-old Judy’s father was one of the 20,000 Chinese seammen working for the British Navy during World War II. She’s hoping DNA can reveal why he disappeared without a trace.

Oh, what a lovely welcome.  Yeah, fine. Thank you.  Judy, I’m Stacy. It’s lovely to meet you.  You, too. Can’t believe it.  Oh, nice. You know, I’ve got a soft spot for scouters.  I’m delighted to be here. Yeah. My mom’s from Speak.  Oh, is she really?  Could we take Oh, yes, please. Oh,  why don’t we start with you telling me what your question is?  Well, my father, Changang, came from China to help the British during the Second World War and disappeared when I was about 18 months old.

I don’t know a lot about my dad, but people say that he adored me. All I knew was that he was a seemingly work for the blue funnel line. All the Chinese were here during the war to help bring food into Liverpool. We were very, very close-knit community. But one day, my dad disappeared. When I got a bit older, my mom did explain to me what had happened that night, that he hadn’t come home and other of her friends husbands, they hadn’t come home.

 And they were hysterical cuz they were running around looking and asking other people, do they know where he is? All his clothes were still there and everything, all his belongings, everything. You know, as I got older, mom said the British government decided there was too many Chinese seaman and they needed to get rid of some of them.

So, they’d been picked up and put into vans and then they were taken down to Murzy and put into big ships and taken out into the Atlantic and that was it. How can they do that? 250 to 300 went missing that night.  That’s outrageous.  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.  So, they just never came home.  No.  So, after they’d worked incredibly hard,  set up a home here, established a family, they were then forcibly deported,  and the wives and the kids were offered no explanation in terms of what’s happened to their husband or dad.

 Nothing. Not a thing. I know.  How do you process that at such a young age? Do you  It was very very difficult. Very, very difficult cuz I I can remember even though I was young, I can remember crying a lot.  Yeah.  So, I suppose your question is what happened to your father?  Yes.

 What happened to him? I’d just like to know the truth about decisions that the government made. M  how did your mom react when you would sort of try and talk about your dad’s and talk about what had happened?  Well, after a while we never really spoke about much cuz she thought he was dead, you see.  So, it was her belief.

 Your mom thought that  they were taken down to the Mury, put into ships, taken out to the Atlantic and blown up.  Who told her that?  It just went round that that’s what had happened. You know,  hellish experience.  Yeah.  I’m sort of sat here now. Judy, what do you think happened to your dad?  I don’t know.

 Because there was a lot of talk in the Chinese community saying the ships weren’t blown up. They just took them back to China and that was it.  So, who do you believe? I can show you the picture of me dad when you’re ready.  I’d love to see. Yeah. Is that all right?  Yeah. Quinny handsome.  This is your dad’s, your mom, and you.

Yes. And on the back  she’s wrote, “Miss Moing and baby darling, you have now leave me. It’s 10 months about.”  God, your poor mom.  She never knew what happened to him ever.  I can’t imagine that. You know, you’ve been so in love with someone. You set up a home. You got your little girl  and then he never he never comes back.

He just disappears.  That’s right. Yeah. A lot of the children now, a lot of them around about my age, maybe a little bit, have passed away. So they died never ever knowing.  It’s unbelievable.  Yeah.  You just want clarity really, right?  Yeah. It’d be amazing.  It’s a bit nippy, but not unbearable.

 No, it’s not too bad.  I mean, it’s such a treat being down here, isn’t it? And it’s it is  this place is drenched in history.  I’m looking now and thinking he’s most probably strolled through these warehouses.  Your dad?  Yeah. Yeah. He must have, mustn’t he? And here I am sitting here.  How does that make you feel?  It’s always made me feel strange cuz I think, oh, bless him, you know, and then they took him away, you know.

 Sad, isn’t it  to think that they did so much and yet they were taken away.  Yeah, I hear you. The idea that they came over here, they probably sacrificed a lot, left their home country, worked really hard,  thought they’d have a life here with their wife and baby,  and yet that just disappeared one night.  They must have just felt so confused.

 Yeah.  And how often do you think about what your dad must have been thinking, must have gone through, like from his perspective?  God knows. Must have been scared. I hope he got back safe. I do honestly  cuz it’s not fair what happened to him.  It must be hard to accept what he was put through when it’s your dad.

 It is.  The thing I’m most worried about is is it true that they took the ships out into the Atlantic and blew them up? Cuz that is horrendous, isn’t it? I mean, the whole ordeal just sounds so inhumane.  It doesn’t It doesn’t sound real, does it?  I’m just glad that this DNA might find out something.

 Even if they don’t find nothing there, I’ve done my best, haven’t I?  I’ve tried to find you, Dad. You know,  I get that.  Yeah. Yeah. For years, Judy, alongside other families who were affected, has been trying to find what happened to the seaman that disappeared. Now, through DNA testing, she’s hoping to find a match on the worldwide databases that will be able to give her answers.

Come on in, Judy. Come and sit down. How are you? I’m fine. It’s lovely to meet you.  You, too. Now, how can I help you? Do you know what? I don’t know where to begin with it all, honestly.  Okay.  I just don’t know where to begin with it all. My father is a Chinese seaman and he disappeared when I was little and he never came home.

 My mom was told that he was picked up and then they were shipped down to the Murzy, put into boats and then taken out into the Atlantic. And my mom was always informed that when they got out to the Atlantic, they blew the ships up. criying. When I tell people about it, they say, “You’re joking. You know what?” They they’ve never even heard anything about it.

 Chinese mariners were a hugely important part of Britain’s World War II effort. And after the end of the war, racial tensions apparently are are rising. There was a secret meeting that went on in October 1945 and it was decided by the British government that they would be forcibly deported.  I’ve always wanted to know what happened to him.

 Did he get back to China?  This is a really extraordinary part of this country’s history. And DNA is one of the few avenues that we can use to try and uncover what happened to your father. We will take your DNA.  Yes.  And we upload it to databases around the world. So if he he’s made it back to China, it could be that he went on and had other children.

 Yeah. The real difficulty in terms of finding potential relatives is that commercial DNA testing in China is just not that popular at the moment. It’s going to be very very difficult. But all we can do is try.  Yeah, we can try other routes obviously as well. We can try seeing if we can look in any of the records and just see if there’s anything that we can find for you.

 But this is going to be a really difficult search. Doesn’t matter what you find out, but just to find something out, you know what I mean, will be amazing.  Only around 800,000 of China’s 1.4 billion people have taken a commercial DNA test, which means Jury and the team will also be scouring historic records in the hope of uncovering the truth about Judy’s father.

It’s estimated that as many as one in 50 people in the UK are mistaken about who their biological father is. John has little concrete information about his paternal roots and as a result has always had questions about his identity  John.  Hello Stacy.  Hello mate. How are you?  Yeah, I’m good.

 How are you? So nice to meet you too.  Likewise. Thanks for your time. Isn’t this lovely?  Yes, it is.  I’m really embarrassed cuz I’m out of breath walking up them stairs.  I was I was saying the same thing when I came up.  So, John, how are you feeling?  I feel uh excited, but also apprehensive.  Mhm.  Talk me through why you want to take a DNA test.

 What you hoping to find out?  Okay. Well, I I don’t know partly where I came from. I have never known who my biological father is.  It’s been a lifelong mystery and uh it’s quite exciting to think that it could possibly be solved.  So, are you happy to tell me a bit about what it was like growing up? Yeah, I was brought up in Glasgow  by my mother and I thought my father  right  as a child I was a little bit mischievous, a little bit outgoing.

 I have lots of happy memories of being a kid.  I love to play football with friends. We all used to play in the street. But then questions started to arise because of the color of my skin. I was the only kind of dark skinned kid in the neighborhood. My parents and my half sister were all white and in Glasgow that’s whiter than white.

In the 1960s things were pretty different back then. So sometimes statements would be made that would not be tolerable today. So I started to go back to my parents and say, “Look, these people are saying these things, not very nice things,  slurs.”  Yeah.  But I would it would just be shut down. I would be told, “You’re white.

 Don’t be ridiculous.” So, how did you find out that your stepfather wasn’t your biological father?  Just by pure chance, really. One day, my parents were both out. I kind of climbed into the wardrobe and pulled out some boxes of papers and I came across my birth certificate and my parents’ marriage certificate. There was no name on the birth certificate for the father  and um I could see that my my mother and my stepfather had married much later just before I turned three.

 Okay.  So I was able to put two and two together from that. On the one hand answered some questions and made sense but I also felt a bit guilty. We thought I’ve done something wrong and I didn’t talk about it to anybody.  Wow. Mhm.  It must have been quite taxing at times carrying around this massive secret.

 Mhm.  So, did you ever have the conversation with your mom?  Yeah, I did bring it up much later by saying, “Look, mom, you know, I love you, but I just would really like to know who my dad is.” And that’s when she told me that she did have friends who were Italian and it was a cousin of one of those Italian friends that she got pregnant from wedlock.

 Okay. and um that they had been in love and that he’d returned to his home country before she found out she was pregnant and she made the cousin swear not to tell him which sounds very romantic but I have my doubts. I’m not convinced.  Why?  I’m a journalist. So, I think as a journalist, I like to see the evidence before I tend to believe things.

 The the story that she told was almost like a fairy tale. And so, it just makes me wonder if she felt it would be a better story to tell. There is some evidence to say that the story that she told me is possible. you know, some Italian friends I remember visiting when I was really young.  So, there is an element of truth to all of that.

 But a lot of people have suggested that I look Asian. And I wonder if maybe she was made to feel so bad about having a child who had brown skin that she might decide to come up with a story that she felt might be more palatable. M  you think people back then may have been slightly more accepting  if it were an Italian man.

 My grandfather, I later discovered, had thrown her out of the house because he was worried about what the neighbors would think.  And I found out that my mom had fought tooth and nail to keep me and to raise me, which uh really sums up my mom. Your mother’s father would have put pressure on her to hand you over for adoption.

 Yeah.  So, she must have really sort of dug her heels to keep you.  Yeah, I know she did. Yeah.  So, the main goal here is to try and establish, you know, what your ancestry looks like.  Yeah. There’s just this big unanswered question hanging over my head.  I’m apprehensive. I’m prepared for disappointment.

 But I’m an adult now. It’s time to be brave. Yeah.  Having lived for most of his life with uncertainty about his paternal ancestry, John hopes Churi can now help him find some clarity.  Lovely to meet you.  Lovely to meet you, too.  So, how can I help you? I’m looking to find out what I can about my ancestry on my father’s side.

 Mhm. So, what do you know so far?  Very, very little. You know, when I was younger, people would say, “Well, you don’t look Scottish. You don’t look like somebody on a porridge box, you know.” And when my mom had me, she was very secretive her whole life about who the father was.  Okay.

 So, did she give you any hints as to who we might be?  She said she’d had a boyfriend who was Italian.  Mhm.  Did a little bit of digging at the time, couldn’t find anything out.  I suppose the other thing to bear in mind is, I mean, Glasgow is a port city, so is bound to have huge diversity. So, for example, the Italian community really starts growing in the 1890s and now there’s around 100,000 Italians in Scotland.

Of course, there were a lot of different immigrant communities at that time. So, really, your biological father could be from anywhere.  You know, when I was younger, people would say that I looked Asian. Other people would say you look Italian. I’ve not known my entire life. So anything new on that front would be a completely new chapter in my life.

 Chur and her team will be using markers in John’s DNA to identify specific regions across the globe. that his ancestry could be from.  Hi.  Hia. Happy birthday.  Happy birthday.  A thank you. Come on in then.  Oh, flowers.  Oh, yeah. Judy is waiting for the results of her DNA test, which she’s hoping will reveal what happened to her father when he disappeared after the war.

 Okay, come on. This way. This way. It’s not just me who wants to know about my dad. My children want to know about their granddad. And my grandchildren want to know about their great-granddad cuz they know nothing. One of my grandchildren said, “Let’s go to China together and find out ourselves.” She did. Want  some help?  Uh, yeah, please.

 Uh, that looks like the chow.  Right. Can you come and sit down?  Well done.  It must have been hard for my mom to be deprived of information of her dad and just be robbed of all those answers. If nothing turns up, I’m just so pleased that I tried. Whatever happens, I’ve done my best, haven’t I?  And no matter what, he’ll always be my father.

 Yeah. I’ve always felt very connected to my Chinese side and I’m really proud of being half Chinese. I always think what happened to me dad always. It’s there at the back of your mind all the time really. How nice it would have been for him to be here to see us. Particularly when we got married, I thought, “Oh gosh, my dad would be proud of me if he could see me.” Yeah.

My husband passed away not so long ago. And one of the last conversations I had with him, it was about finding my dad. And he just said to me, “Go for it, Jude. You’ve come this far. Go for it. Good luck, Mom.  Thank you.  Come on in. Come sit down.  Oh, thank you, Chewy.  How are you?  Fine, thank you.

 It’s lovely to see you again.  So, when you  first came to us?  Yes.  It was essentially to try and find out about your father.  Yes. You told us this really quite heartbreaking story about how your father was essentially taken away in the night when you were about 2 years old.  Yeah.  So, let me take you through the the DNA results.

 So, of course, China is a huge country. It’s 39 times the size of the UK and it has over 50 different ethnic groups.  Yes.  So across this huge expanse, what we’re trying to do is use the genetic matches to narrow down where your paternal family is from. And we can tell you they’re from around Ningo and Shanghai.  Shanghai. Thought it would be Shanghai.

 Eastern China.  So these are port cities just like Liverpool. I’ve  been to Shanghai once you  years and years ago. That’s amazing that to think that well at least I’ve been there.  Yeah.  Yeah. And then the second thing we’re doing is we’re looking to see if you’re getting any DNA matches that suggest that you have a common ancestor.

 Yeah.  Meaning they’re related to your father or descended from him and he therefore made it back. And really sadly there was nothing close enough to be family. Nothing. That being said, these databases are growing all of the time. More and more people, particularly of Chinese heritage, are becoming extremely interested in DNA tests.

 So, because you’ve taken this step, though there’s nobody on the databases at the moment, somebody could take a test who’s related to you. It could be 6 months, could be a year, 2 years, and we’ll be able to see them. It might not happen in my my lifetime, but they might find out in the end.

 my children might find out in the end. So, I’m just glad I’ve opened that door.  I know one of the things you were really worried about was these horrible stories about how some of the ships that were used for repatriation, they were sunk.  We have had specialist researchers working for us as well, going through the historical documents.  Yes.

and they’ve been, you know, going through the national archives looking for the name that you’ve given us, Chang Oang.  Yeah, that’s right.  And I mean, it’s been a huge amount of work.  And one of the most shocking things they found was how little is accurately recorded on these documents.  Oh, right.

 People’s names weren’t translated properly or  even on one record. Yes,  the names of the European passengers are given in full, but the Chinese seaman are just recorded as cargo.  I mean, it’s such a shameful part of our history what happened to these people.  Yeah.  But what they found is shipping records.  The researchers have looked at every single ship.

 Yeah. And we can see from the records that all of the boats that were used for repatriation made it back after these journeys.  Oh my goodness.  And were later retired or decommissioned at a much later date.  They weren’t sunk.  No. Can find them in the records. We know what happened to the boats.  All right. Okay.

 So, it’s highly likely that he made it back to China.  So, you can lay that to rest.  Yeah.  Yeah.  Yeah. Artui, thank you. You’re welcome. Thank you. Do you know what? I’m so glad. I really am so glad the boats weren’t sunk and we did make it back to China. I hope he had a life. Maybe not the life he wanted, you know what I mean? But he he had a life.

 So that makes me feel better inside. And I’ll tell the grandchildren that because they’ll be made up as well.  And my own children, of course.  Yeah.  Yeah. Thank you so much. You’re welcome.  You fill that big gap.  Good.  Ah, Stacy. You’re all right, J. Lovely to see you. Lightweight.  Thank you.  You have a seat. How you feeling?  That was good.

 Yeah. And what I was relieved by was, you know, Tori was saying that all of the boats that were sent out, we’ve been able to find each and every one of those boats.  Yeah. So, we would have had some life, which makes it a little bit easier, you know what I mean? So, that’s made me feel a lot better.  Good.

 And actually, we’re only able to use the the DNA that’s available at the moment.  At the moment. Yeah.  You know, in 5 or 10 years time, it could be completely different, couldn’t it? And the thing is, the only way these registers, these databases grow is if people like you come forward. Yeah. And are willing to participate.

 Yeah.  And you’ve done that. And  you’ve been very dignified how you’ve done it. So  I think you mustn’t underestimate what you have managed to achieve here because what you’ve done is you have told us about your father and actually prior to meeting you, I didn’t even know what had gone on.

 So, you know, you you telling us means that we’re forced to have these conversations and in doing that you you you keep his legacy alive.  Thank you,  Penny. What do you make of what your mother’s done? She’s been so brave. She really has. And for me, I’m really proud. The amount of people that now know that never knew before.

 It’s fantastic.  Oh, don’t pen.  You’re a class act. You really, really are, Judy. Thank you. Well done.  And she always says everything with a smile. So I’m not smiling now. H.  I’m really proud of her. Sisters Spit Lana and Oxana have taken refuge in the UK. They’re hoping to trace some of their family who also found refuge here over 75 years ago.

Hi Stacy.  Stacy, how are you?  I am fine, thank you. I am Oxana.  You’re Hello Stacy. Nice to meet you, Swit Lana.  Spit Lana. Got you. Oh, ladies, thanks for having me.  I’ll follow you. We through here.  Come on.  Thank you.  So, Spit Lana, you’re living here?  Yes.

 My family and Oxana live near Manchester.  You’re up north.  Yeah.  Will we go and have a quick chat? Is that all right?  We thrilled.  I cannot imagine. It must have been such a difficult decision to leave everything you know your home.  Yeah, it’s really difficult decision. But when you must survive with your family and children, it was decision like when you haven’t a choice.

We used to live in big city in Ukraine. I was a doctor. I work in a hospital. We uh have really happy life. It was like a fairy tale. We lived in peaceful place and uh change in one moment. I was very very afraid. In one moment you must flee from Ukraine.  We decided to move to Great Britain to change our life for my children and Oxana’s children.

Can you tell me what is it that you’re both trying to find out?  We are searching for our relatives in UK. Uh  uncle of our father after the second world war. He uh had this force to live here to start a life again. My great uncle moved to UK from age 26 because of the pressure from Russia. After the Second World War, the USSR’s communist regime occupied parts of Ukraine, which led to many fleeing in fear of repression.

 If my great uncle didn’t flee from Ukraine, he could go to jail or be killed. He lived here in UK until he died. He had a a wife and a daughter.  My great uncle didn’t be in touch with relatives because it was very dangerous.  I can completely understand why you would want to try and find potential family members who are also based here.

You know, you’ve left Kev, you’ve left everything you’ve ever known.  Yeah.  To to come here. And it sounds like your great uncle, he he did the same  just decades  ago.  It’s easier to know that somebody from our family had the same experience and it helps to feel more confident. It sounds like, you know, you’ve been through similar things, similar circumstances have meant that you’ve had to come to the UK and try and sort of  place your roots here and make sure that your family are are settled here.

 I feel that uh when somebody from our family can do it before that we can do it now and to live here to start new life. And I I imagine you could do with, you know, some family members here to, you know,  make you feel more at home.  Yeah, family is much more important for me now.

 It’s a big support to know that somebody like you, it’s like your blood.  Yeah. It’s that feeling of connection and the idea that you can hopefully make the UK feel like a home.  Mhm. Like second home.  Yeah.  Yeah. like a second home.  Yeah.  It’s so frightening and it’s so sobering to me that you can be so happy and then through no fault of your own, your life is just turned  upside down.

 Yes.  I never could believe that it was happen with us. Spit Lana and Oxana are hoping that Chi will be able to help find out if a relative in the UK has already taken a DNA test.  Hello. Come on in. Come sit down.  Hello.  It’s lovely to meet you.  Lovely to meet you, Jury.  So, how can I help you? Oh, we had a story with our grand uncle.

 Yeah.  Long time ago, he moved to UK and lived here all his life. And we know that he had a daughter.  Yeah. And maybe his daughter has children. It’s what we looking for.  Okay. So, one of the things I always explain is that DNA doesn’t follow geopolitical borders. And I know you’ve come from  Ukraine.

 The Ukraine  and it’s had massive changes over the last century. In the past, it’s been dominated by Poland, Lithuania, Russia. After the war, it’s part of the Soviet Union. And that’s around the time that you think your great uncle came over.  I think we think after after war. Yeah. Obviously, the one of the issues is going to be records.

 So, there’s not tons of records online necessarily. So, in terms of building a family tree, that can be a little bit difficult. So, what I’m going to do is we’re going to be taking your DNA and we will upload it to databases around the world. We’ll have a look at your ancestry, but also see if we can find you some relatives and particularly look for ones in this country.

 It’s been so lovely to meet you. I’m really hopeful we can give you some answers.  Thank you, Terry.  You’re welcome.  Thank you very much. See you soon. See you. Having struggled his whole life to find out the truth of where his father was from, John is waiting for his DNA results. I know that I’m half Scottish.

 I don’t know the other half. I have a family of my own. I think it would be good for them to know if possible. I was in my late 20ies before I told anyone that my stepfather wasn’t my biological father and that was my wife.  Being open about that is still quite nerve-wracking for me. A lot of my friends ask me where I’m from and I’m never able to tell them.

So, it’ll be good to finally be able to know and confirm.  We did think when we were in Sicily last year that there were a lot of Sicilian boys that look like you.  A couple of my friends have told me that they think I’m from the Middle East.  I think that’s unlikely. There weren’t many people, if any, from that region in Scotland at that time.

 Only one.  That’s true. Ever since my mom told me that story about the Italian man, I’ve doubted it. And that has discouraged me from finding out, I think, because I’ve probably subconsciously realized that that could be quite difficult to discover that perhaps my mother hadn’t told me the truth. I don’t hold any blame.

I’m just looking for the truth. I’m looking for facts and I’m trying to find that part of me that’s missing. John and his wife Evelyn are meeting Chury to see what she’s found out.  Okay, see you soon. Thank you. Okay. So when you came the first time, it was essentially to find out about your ancestry.  Yes.

 So I know your mom had told you that your dad was an Italian student, and I can tell you that he wasn’t. So you were right to question what your mom had said. Your ancestry on your biological father’s side is from northern India.  Wow.  Punjab, Pakistan. And that that came up really quite clearly.  That’s really interesting.

 Yeah. So I’m going to show you on a map. So during the partition of 1947, the Punjab was actually split across Pakistan and northern India into East and West Punjab. So your father probably came over as part of the big migration that happened in the 60s and 70s. So strongly suspect that’s how your biological father came to be here.

 That’s really interesting because I had some inclination to think that he might be Asian. So it’s great to finally get a definitive answer to that question.  The other thing we do when we’re looking at somebody’s ancestry is that we look and see what matches are they getting. Who are they matching in the database?  Mhm.

 The connections that you’re getting at the moment are really quite distant. So sort of great great grandparent  level.  So without records it’s very very difficult to work out how you connect.  Okay.  In that part of the world DNA testing is not something that people do very much. But DNA testing is really growing in these communities at the moment and it’s because of the partition.

 People now are starting to think actually I’d like to know a little bit more about my heritage. So I think give it 6 months a year it could be that somebody pops up  on the database and you’re then able to make this connection.  Okay. It’s really answered a question that I’ve not really known the answer to my entire life. So, it’s fantastic.

 Yeah.  Without your help, I might never have known. Thank you so much.  You’re welcome.  Hi, D.  Yeah, fine. Absolutely fine.  No, I’m good.  Hello,  Evelyn. I’m Stacy. It’s a real pleasure to meet you. Get comfy. Lovely to see you again.  Likewise, John, how are you how you feeling?  Yeah, I’m good, thanks.

 Yeah.  Yeah.  I mean, my mom’s made up a story. I suspected she had, but I have no doubt whatsoever about how much she loved me, and I just wish that she hadn’t had to go through some of the orals that she went through.  Yeah. Sat here now knowing categorically what your ancestry, what your heritage looks like, what does that give you? How does that change things? It means that there’s a lot of kind of I don’t know sort of misinformation or static that’s always been in my head and I can just let that go now and understand that that

was not relevant.  I didn’t know anything and you know it means I’m no longer you know lying in bed at night or whatever thinking about all the different possibilities. So it kind of settles me if you like.  You feel settled?  Yeah, I feel really content with that information.  Good.

 I think I can move on from that now.  That’s music to our ears.  Thank you so much, Stacy. An estimated 6 million Ukrainians have found refuge in Europe since Russia invaded at the start of 2022. Sisters Fit Lana and Oxana are hoping their DNA tests will identify family in the UK and help them settle in the country they now call home. My family now in this time in present moment is very important for me.

I understood the value of this life. It’s said to be your family with your relatives. If we have this family, it’s good for me, good for children, good for all our family. It helps uh to live because you know that you are not alone. You have roots, you have branches and uh you can grow your family tree stronger and bigger.

For the past 3 months, Professor Chury King and her team have been searching the DNA databases of over 30 million people to find out if one of them may be a close relative of Spitana and Oxana. Come on in. Come sit down. It’s really lovely to see you again.  Lovely to see you, too. It’s very exciting to know our results today.

 Yeah. Okay. So when you first came it was because essentially you’ve been through a massive thing in your lives and as you’ve been settling here I know one of the things that you were thinking about was if we could find potentially family members here. So when you came to us it was about whether or not DNA could help you with this.

 Obviously, we’re completely at the mercy of who has taken a DNA test already in terms of the matches. There was a lot of work that went into this. So, obviously, we’re going through records. We’re looking at DNA. We’re trying to build the family tree. So we know that your family large chunks of the family have stayed together but your other parts of your family have scattered to various parts of the world.

 Yeah.  Mhm.  And I can tell you that we did get some matches.  Yeah. So, we knew your granddad’s brother Paulo fled and came here after World War II, but your granddad also had a cousin and he did the same thing and we found his son.  Wow.  Shall I draw you a family?  Yes.  Tree.  Okay. So we have got you two.

 Okay.  Like this. Here is your dad.  Yeah.  Here is granddad. And then  this is Paulo.  Okay.  And it comes down here  to Steven. So he is your cousin.  He is your English relative that we found.  Yeah.  So his parents came over here because of World War II  and settled here.  He was born here  and he has got children  and grandchildren, some around the same age as your  children.

 and he was utterly delighted to hear about you.  Thank you.  Thank you very much.  Such amazing results that we have a family here  who we are hoping will be able to give you that connection that you were hoping for. Somebody who’s here whose family has gone through a similar thing to what you’re going through at the moment.  Oh, thank you.

 Yeah. Hi guys.  Hi Stacy.  Come in. How are you?  Fine. Thank you.  Good. It’s really, really good to see you both. How do you feel?  We can’t wait to hear from you. What can you tell us about our new relatives? So, as Troy was explaining, we have managed to contact your family here in the UK.  And he has sent you some messages  and he’s asked me to play them for you.

Is that okay?  Yes, please.  Mo Simar, hopefully my Ukrainian is is Remo, which means hello my family. Uh I’m your cousin Steve and I live in Manchester in the northwest of England. My family um come from Berlin uh in Ukraine. One of the difficulties my parents had coming across they had nobody to help them.

 Spidana Oxana, you can ask me any questions you want. If you want my help, I’m I’m more than happy to have a vodka with you and just help you and guide you. Um on your way in this wonderful country.  Byebye.  Thank you.  Brilliant video.  Yes.  Very emotional.  Yeah.  It’s pretty amazing really.  Yeah. A little in it. I am in shock.

 It sounds like he’s um he’s up for taking you to the pub.  Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you do have family here.  You do. And he said, “I understand how difficult it can be to try and make a place feel like home.”  And this is your home for however long you want it to be. And  it is important that you feel looked after and you feel like you’ve got people rooting for you.

 So, yeah. When I saw our relative, it’s like you feel it’s relationship because I never seen these people before. But when I listen to conversation, it’s like I know these people.  I understand that. Yeah, I get that.  And I hope it’s not not end of the story, but it’s a continue of our family story.  Thank you. Total, total pleasure.

 It’s nice to meet you.  Two months later, Oxana and Spit Lana have invited Steve, their newfound English cousin traced by Churi to meet their family.  I was really very surprised that we have relative in UK. We feel less alone and it give us a big support. Okay. The fact that we have family here will help us to make our new steps in this new life.

Although I’m completely anglicized, there’s always a deep connection to the Ukraine. Family is very important to me. As I was growing up, I felt my family was very very small compared to my peer groups. And then to find another connection, another branch, I’m I’m really finding out how huge my roots are.

 and and um here we are today.  Hello.  Hello, Steven.  Give me hope.  It’s mom.  Oxana and Spitlana’s mother, Tamara, who also fled Ukraine, is joining them. Come on in. We have a stolen.  Oh my goodness.  I’ve got you a little present. Um  I found these old photographs.  And I’ve got a photograph here of Pavlov.

 Um so these are photographs from my mother’s and father’s wedding. And that’s Pavlov there.  Yeah, he’s very handsome man.  And this is also Pavlov here.  So here’s here’s another little gift for you.  Oh, thank you very much.  It’s our grandmother. Ah,  your grandfather.  That’s right. And this is your father.

 So that’s how we connected. Look at that. Wow. Look at that. That’s just like how my mom used to make it.  Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful.  If there’s anything I can do to help you, you know, and give you advice and do things, I I I I will do that.  Yes. Thank you, Steve. Thank you. Finding a family here in UK will make us more happy.

 It definitely feels like a beginning of something new.  We are happy to be together with our families and it’s just the start of a new story. Hi everyone.  I’m fine, thank you. Nice to see you. Douggee said, I’ve got a love child in

in Germany and we would like to know if she is still alive.  I’m really happy that we’re doing it. I think it’s important for us. We’re all in it together.  All my life I’ve been led to believe that my father was Pakistani.  It will be an emotional process for her. whatever they find out.  It’s all about people that love you, the people that have been there for you.

And yet, there is a pull back to DNA and who you’re biologically related to.  I’m so pleased to tell you we have found genetic relatives