Man Discovers His Father Wasn’t His Father — and Gains 6 New Siblings — with MyHeritage DNA

What if you took a DNA test and discovered that your father wasn’t who you thought he was?

And what if that discovery led to 6 loving new siblings into your life?

That’s what happened to George Graham Green of Hull, England. Watch his emotional reunion with his half-siblings here:

George grew up in a small 2-bedroom apartment with 10 brothers and sisters, and served in the Royal Engineers of the British Army for 22 years. Today, at 74 years old, he manages a charity foundation called FEADA (Foundation for East African Development and Education) with his wife, and volunteers in the National Coast Watching Institute. He is, in his words, “not the normal 75-year-old sitting on his backside watching TV.”

Graham and his wife Rose were working on researching Rose’s family history, and as part of that project, she took a MyHeritage DNA test. The process made Graham curious about his own roots, so he purchased a DNA kit for himself… and the results turned everything he thought he knew about himself on its head.

They showed that he had a half-sister living in the United States.

He’d never known anyone from the United States.

Confused, Graham started calling his brothers to ask if they knew anything about a half-sibling in the U.S. Finally, one confessed that he’d known for years: the man Graham had always believed was his father was not actually his father.

When Graham demanded to know why no one had told him about this, his brother said, “Graham, we were brothers and sisters, you were one of the family. Why would we ever bring it up?”

After some emotional processing, Graham reached out to his half-sister Cathy. It turned out that Graham’s mother had met Cathy’s father — a U.S. soldier based in the Yorkshire area during WWII — briefly before D-Day. Graham was born 9 months later. “It’s strange, because I believe he was in the engineers as well, which is a coincidence,” says Graham.

Unfortunately, Graham’s biological father died in 1980 at the age of 64… and Graham’s newfound siblings — Cathy, Marsha, Harry, Sharon, Norma, and Mike — were floored by Graham’s resemblance to him. “This is totally amazing,” says Graham. “I am 75 years old and I’m just finding out that I’ve got American sisters. The whole thing has gone absolutely crazy since then. The youngest brother in the States said, ‘You know, you look like our father more than we do.’ There’s lots of messages between my children and their children. So they’re absolutely loving it.”

“It was like I was looking into my father’s eyes,” says Cathy of the first time she saw a photo of Graham. “And that was it.”

“If he was out there, I wouldn’t want to leave his side,” says Graham. “I would want to know all about him, and I know he would want to know all about me.”

In September, Graham met his American siblings for the first time. They eagerly awaited him at the airport in Seattle and applauded when they saw him coming up the escalator, so excited to meet and embrace their brother after a lifetime apart.

“I am forever grateful to MyHeritage,” says Cathy.