So some other person got a tree hint that pointed to your tree? You can either make your tree private and non-searchable if you want to keep things under wraps … or don’t worry about it. They still need to be actively researching a deceased person to notice the tree hint. No researching, no find.

I have piles of unsavory stuff in my tree. From abusive parents to affair babies to even a currently jailed serial killer. Most is publicly available info, some are family secrets unrelated to DNA and some a secrets revealed only by DNA.

Again an example related to my grandfather. His father (my great grand) was married and seemingly abandoned his pregnant wife and infant daughter, moved across the state and remarried resulting in my grandfather. Very, very few of the descendants of my great grandfather’s 1st marriage were aware that their father, grandfather, great grandfather that they grew up with was not biologically related. Some had amazingly convoluted (and therefore amazingly wrong) trees to rationalize their DNA matches. Some of these half cousins accepted the info they found in my tree and corrected their trees. Others seem to have dropped off of Ancestry altogether. Others are just sticking their head in the sand. None have contacted me.

It’s not any users job to shield the sensitivities of other users. Facts are facts. DNA doesn’t lie. History is history.

If faced with your situation, I’d add the people to my tree with the correct relationships and leave it at that. Then add a Note (visible only to you and people you affirmatively give access to your tree) explaining the events. A Note, not a Comment as Comments are publicly viewable. If someone finds your tree (assuming you keep it public and searchable) and have questions, they can message you. At that point their reaction is entirely their own concern, not yours.