This chapter is devoted to those people
named in various records whose name is spelled in such a way as to make one
think they are HYTENs or HITENs when in fact they are not.
There are two names that constantly came up in my research that
caused much confusion, HEIGHTON and HYDEN. The first is both
a common misspelling of HYTEN in the
early years and fully separate family. The latter is a fully separate family
whose members often had their name spelled HYTEN
or HITEN in records. As I have
previously noted, in a couple cases that error remained permanent.
HEIGHTONS
Don Heighton[1]
of Texas has done extensive research on the HEIGHTON
family tracing its roots back to England in the 1500s. In his direct line Thomas Heighton (1793- ) immigrated to America in 1828, well after HYTENs were established here.
When I was visiting my son Mark
in Pensacola, Florida, at Christmas time, 1986, I found Jim Heighton in the phone book. Much to my surprise and delight he told me that his father
had been born in Mattoon, Illinois.
I "knew" that I had found the heirs of one of Thomas Otho Hyten’s missing
sons, Thomas A. or William M.
Jim and his father were both named Raymond James Heighton.
The elder went by Ray; the
younger by Jim. Jim said that his father had been put
in a foster home when he was 5 or 6 and had run off from there when he was 11
or 12. He had joined the Army at
age 16. He married Lillie Mae Neil (1942-1974) in San Bernardino, CA. Jim had been born on Jan. 4, 1953 while his dad was
stationed at Pensacola NAS, FL. He
was the fourth of six children. Wayne Edward was born in 1943; Marilyn
Jean Hyten-DeForest (1947); Neil Eugene
(1949); Richard Dale (1956); and Robert Dean (1958). Ray
retired to California and died in 1976.
In the Coles County, IL, records I found Ray 's birth record. He was born Dec. 22, 1924, the fourth child of
E.S.Heighton, a 41 year old carpenter
who had been born in Iowa, and Irma
Devore, a 23 year old born in Illinois. Ray was born at
733 C St., Charleston, IL. The
death records show Edward S. Heighton
dying on June 7, 1932, and buried in Dodge Grove Cemetery in Mattoon. Ray
would have been seven at the time thus pretty well corresponding to the time he
supposedly went into a foster home.
Index 2 (?) lists Edith Heighton,
dependent, 11684; Marjorie Heighton, dependent, 11685; and Marjorie Heighton, adopted, 11726. I suppose that these were other
children of Edward who were left as
orphans when he died.
Naturally I was a bit disappointed to find that Jim was really a HEIGHTON and not a HYTEN.
A couple of other census records contain HEIGHTONs who Don
Heighton tells me are in fact
HEIGHTONs:
The 1860 Iowa census of Marshall County lists a J.A. Heighton, age 32, (Who is actually John Henry Heighton, (1825- ) born in
England, and his wife, G.A. (Sarah Ann
Cleaver-Heighton) (1840-1902) age 20, born in Ohio. There is no other reference to them so
I cannot connect them to Ray' s
father Edward who had been born in
Iowa.
Another HEIGHTON that I chased down was also
born in England. The 1850 Indiana
census of LaPorte County lists William
Heighton (William G. Heighton) (1815-1877)
age 32, and his wife, Rebecca, (Rebecca B. Cleaver-Heighton)
(1824-1902), age 26, born in Pennsylvania, and their six children. At first I thought this William might be the same William Hyten who heads that big
unconnected branch of HYTENs out of
Hamilton County, Illinois because his name was spelled Heighton in his wife Virginia
Cox's family Bible.
HYDENS
Gene Hyden[2]
is a genealogist’s genealogist. His dedication and tenacity
are unbelievable. He provided me with a great deal of HYTEN information which he had accululated during his quest of HYDENs.
According to Gene Hyden the following are actually HYDENs:
The index of the 1860 census of Jasper County, Illinois, lists Wm. Riley Hiten (18), Mary E. Hiten (17),
and James F. Hiten all living with an
Amanda Campbell who was Amanda Meese, before she married Richard Hyden (born in IN).
Looking at the actual census sheet, Gene says the listing
also includes Henry Messe (33), maybe her brother, also a David, maybe Meese,
and Henry, Mary, and James.
William Riley Hyden (born 12-8-1840) married Frances “Fanny” Smith (born 7-1845) in
Dec. 1864, in Jasper County, IL. They both died in Springfield, Greene County,
MO.
My review of the
Jasper County marriage index found on page 115 Mary E. Hiden marrying
Samuel A. Boyd on Jan. 10,1861 and on page 266 William R. Hiden marrying
Fanny Smith on Dec. 10, 1864.
The 1830 census lists Richard
Hyton in Pulaski County. He is
actually a HYDEN as is James Hiten
in the 1840 Pulaski Co., KY records. 1850 lists Wm. Hyton in Floyd County who is also a HYDEN.
WILLIAM TAYLOR HYDEN
The Hyten-Hydens of Arkansas
Among the HYDEN census records you will note
several references to William Hyten of Horsehead
Township, Johnson County, Arkansas.
Gene Hyden, the keeper of the HYDEN family records,
sent me a history of that family.
William Taylor Hyden was born in Virginia on Feb, 15, 1818,
of unidentified parents. Family
legend says they were "killed in the war" and that William was half Cherokee. He was raised by a Wilson family who
brought him to Arkansas from Kentucky prior to Feb., 1844. At that time he is listed as a member
and deacon of the Harmony, Arkansas, Presbyterian Church.
Around 1850 the many records of his activities in the area begin
frequently spelling his name Hyten
and Hyton. William Taylor seems to have been
quite successful as he conducted many land transactions. He has noted at various times as a
doctor, a judge, a postmaster, and a church elder.
He had nine children between 1844 and 1864. His only son to survive, Lewis
Napoleon "Bud" Hyden, died in Grant, AK, in 1924. The descendants of William and Lewis had a Hyden family reunion in
October of 1986 in Clarksville, AK.
The 1885 Polk Gazette Directory lists under the section Physicians
and Surgeons, Wm. T. Hyten in
Harmony, AR, and W.T. Hyten and L.H. Hyten in Hunt,
AR. Both were very small towns in
Johnson County. Harmony had 200
residents and Hunt had 45 and both had a cotton gin. L.H. Hyten could
have been William 's son Lewie
(Lewis Napolean Hiten) who would have been about 30 by then.
When William 's wife, Lucy May Hardgrove, died in 1888, he
went to the Indian territory to be a doctor. At the age of 75 he married an Indian woman there.
The 1896 Dawes Commission index of native Americans lists W.T. Hyten and L.U. Hyten with the ‘Choctaw Tribe”. I would guess this to be Wiliam Taylor and his son Lewis Napolean.
This occurred at about the same time as Alfred G. Hyden was a
marshal in the same Choctaw Nation area.
Alfred’s son Samuel
Gwinn Hyten grew up in Montgomery County, AR, some 70-80 miles south of
Johnson County. Their story is told in Chapter 9. Samuel, who shows up in records first as a Hyden
and then as a HYTEN, is not closely
related to William Taylor but probably is in some way.
William Taylor returned
to Arkansas to die in 1897. Both
his tombstone in Liberty Hill Cemetery and that of his wife in the Stanley
Cemetery spell their name Hyden.
The only other mention in Johnson County records was in the
marriage records where I found R.N. Hyten
, (who is actually Lewis Napolean) age 21, marrying Nancy
Dake, age 18, on 11-25-1875, and Dailey Hyden, age 21, marrying Mary
Ann Stewart, age 21, on
10-21-1900. Since Arkansas
did not maintain birth and death records prior to 1914, I was not able to find
any more information on them.
William Taylor had a daughter, Margaret
Bowen (1844-1885), who married Robert
Frank Laster (1829/38- ) on Nov. 22, 1860, in Johnson Co., AR, and they had
three children, Laura A. Laster was born a month before they married
(10-9-1860) and Roberta Laura Anna (died Nov. 8, 1861. The similar names would
indicate that both died quite young. The last, Nancy Frankie Laster (1864-1935) was born in Harmony, Johnson
County, AR, and died in Checotah, McIntosh County, OK, which is just twenty
miles from Briartown, OK, and the OKLAHOMA
HITENs.
About the same time, also in Johnson Co., AR, Daisy Hyten married
E.T. Goowin on Dec. 20, 1894.
Despite being sure that William Taylor is a Hyden
, Gene Hyden notes that a 1938 letter written by J.B.F. Laster regarding the family says “Daily and
Taylor live at Ozark, Arkansas and Ire Hyten lives at Coal Hill, AR.
They spell their name Hyden.” Things like this can sure confuse a person.
It’s also interesting to note the history of the OKLAHOMA HITENs that also begins
in Illinois. It pauses in Stone County, Arkansas on the way to the Indian
Territory, OK in 1900. Stone County is just east of Johnson County. Also note
that an OKLAHOMA HITEN married
a Stewart as did an ARKANSAS
HYTEN / HYDEN.
Also a John Alfre Hyden relative of Samuel Gwinn Hyten’s HYDEN ancestors moved in
his old age from Texas to Stone County where he died. This would seem to link
the ARKANSAS HYTEN / HYDEN’s
to the TEXAS HYDEN
/ HYTENs.
With people working on these two families from three different
points of view maybe some day they will be joined or at least clarified.
BLACK HYTENs AND
HITENs
At the risk of sounding racist there are four HYTEN/HITENs that I assume aren’t HYTEN/HITENs because they are identified as black in the records
that list them. In the 1910 census of Morgan Co., AL, there is a 75 year old
black woman named Phylis Hiton. 1910
Cumberland Co., PA, lists Henry Hiten,
who is black with a white wife, Evelyn P. Mullins. 1910 Louisa Co., VA, lists a
black woman, Ella Hiten. World War I
draft records list Augie Hyten (b.
3-8-1895) registering in Perry Co., MS. I realize that these people could have
been descendants of slaves owned by HYTEN/HITENs
but tracking that would be nearly impossible.
The 1920 census lists at least four
black (colored) Hitens: Jack (72) and Anner (15) in Georgia; Stanley E. (21) in
Camp Furlong, New Mexico: and Curtis (12) in TN. There were three Hytens: Long (35) in FL; Eugene (34) in KS;
and Alfred (46) in SC.
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