Welcome

By Ann Sterling on July 2, 2022

It’s time for our semi-annual blog post, and apparently we got mentioned on an Ancestry group, so greetings to all the new people who’ve signed up!

Except, it’s not really a blog. I post almost never. All the action happens in the comments, and every so often I pop in and remind people to check the boxes at the bottom *before* they post a comment or question on the website. That way you’ll get a notification when your question gets answered. If you didn’t check the boxes, no big deal, just check back on the page and see where you are in the queue.

Answers could take several weeks, sometimes longer. Yes, you can nudge me, and I won’t mind. Occasionally things get caught in the spam filter, both here and in my personal email. When that happens, email the admins over at the Hyde DNA Project. They’re pretty good at keeping me on task.

There are some long-term projects pending, but Covid changed both work and family life and we’re only just now starting to get back to whatever “normal” is these days. Once I get through this initial flurry of questions I will talk more about that.

Until next time, be safe, be well, and bring a cell phone with a camera to all your summer research facilities!

Ann

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Posted in Read Queries

19 comments

  • Greetings from a William Hyde from Anson, NC ancestor!
    I’m so thankful for the research recently made available from Traci Thompson at the Braswell Memorial Library in Rocky Mount, NC. There are a couple of us that descend from this Hyde line and are very pleased to see the line traced back to Stephen Hyde of Anson, NC (1751-1815), son of David Hyde (1713-1785), son of Richard Hyde, II (1675-1719), son of Richard Hyde, I (1652-1710). More research shows connections with the Alston/Stallings/Deal/Abrams and Holland families (example: Benjamin James Hyde (1861-1900), son of Stephen Hyde, married Mary A. Holland (1870-1936). And, as Traci put it, “all roads seem to lead to Martin County, NC” for the Hyde line especially from 1850-1940. I am hoping that this recent discovery of the William Hyde line will open more doors in tracing his (and Charlotte’s) sons, John William and Stephen Hide/Hyde. A military record suggests that John William served in the Civil War for 4 months and was discharged due to a disability; and Stephen is last seen in the 1870 census for Upper Conetoe farming. Previously, he was the overseer to the Williams’ farm in Martin, NC (1850-1860). Skipping a generation or two, I know that Mike is anxious to find the missing pieces to Pearl Hyde just as I am in finding out Nick Hyde’s parents’ identities. We believe Nick and Pearl to be brother and sister, but perhaps with 1 different parent. Back to the subject at hand…many thanks to Traci Thompson for the William Hyde research documentation and discovery!

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    • Debra – I’m going to be in touch with you, Mike and Traci very soon. Traci did an incredible job and I’d like to talk with you all about a new page for William and Charlotte that links to the Richard Hide page.

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      • Greetings Ann,

        Still researching my Hyde line (Stephen Hyde, son of William Hyde, who settled in Edgecombe, NC.
        Luck befell me while working with Tracy Thompson – Braswell Memorial Library – on William Hyde, and finding a misplaced document (in another county).
        I’m wondering if luck has befallen me again in finding an appeals case: John Colson vs. Stephen Hyde – Court Minutes Docket 1806-1868, NC Supreme Court, Cumberland, NC. (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSM7-PK79?i=13&cat=269605) If you or anyone still researching this Hyde line can shed any light on this, it would be much appreciated!

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        • Hi Debra, always good to hear back! As you know, John Colson was the nephew of Stephen Hyde’s wife Susannah. Docket reads: “Appeal Case. Question relative to interest of 10 percent on the judgement [agreeably?] to Act of Assembly (meaning a prior ruling) to be referred to Court of Conference.” That court handled mediated settlements.

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  • Hello! I am excited to find this Hyde website! I am a descendant of William Hartwell Hyde; however, I am not sure if my William Hyde is the same ancestor mentioned above. This is the information I have thus far:

    My great grandfather:
    John Henry Hyde b. 1850 Alabama, d. 1900 Louisiana census/family bible to support
    Amanda Moore (2nd wife) b. 1858 Alabama, d. 1911 Louisiana census/family bible to support

    My great-great grandfather:
    William Hartwell Hyde (b. 1826 Alabama, d. 1905 Louisiana) census/marriage records to support
    Sarah Little (wife) b. 1834 Alabama, d. 1910 Louisiana) census/marriage records to support

    Below is my roadblock…I have no facts that Stephen Hyde is the father of William Hartwell Hyde other than word of mouth.

    My great-great-great grandfather:
    Stephen Hyde (b. 1790 N.Carolina, d.1829 Alabama) word of mouth,no documentation to support
    Leah Hyde (wife) word of mouth, no documentation to support

    Any help would be greatly appreciated!!! Thanks in advance. 🙂 Kathleen

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  • Does your Bible record say his name was “William” Hartwell Hyde? All of the records I could find just call him Hartwell (including his gravestone). He is said to have been born in Autauga County, Alabama, b. c. 1825, but he was living in Coosa County in 1850 (they were adjacent counties). We know that William Hyde b. c. 1797, the son of Stephen Hyde and Susanna Colson Fanning, and the husband of Charlotte Parker Hyde, was living – briefly -in Autauga County between 1825 and 1850 but your Hartwell is unlikely to have been their son as William apparently died and Charlotte and the children returned to North Carolina by 1850. But it is possible that William did not die and remained in Alabama with one of his sons.
    With a name like Hartwell – we have to consider whether your ancestor is a descendant of the “original” Hartwell Hyde b. 1759 in North Carolina, who moved to Williamson County, Tennessee, about 1805. That Hartwell had a son named Richard W. Hyde (b. c. 1781) who was married to Lucy Little. He had two sons whose names have not yet been discovered – the older one would have been the right age to be the father of your Hartwell. They were enumerated in the 1820 census for Williamson County, Tennessee, as a male 16-25 (born between 1795-1805) and a male under age 10. The older son would likely have been born in North Carolina before Hartwell moved to Tennessee.
    There were loads of Hydes in Alabama by the mid-1800s – many of them came from southern states – but others skipped all the way down there from New York – including a Henry Hyde b. 1780.
    If you have a male Hyde relative and they are willing to do the FamilyTreeDNA Big-Y test – we can determine whether you fit into the line of Hartwell Hyde of Williamson County, TN. Two descendants of his brother Henry have already done the test and matched. We are currently working on the line of Hydes that includes Henry and Hartwell and their cousin Stephen – they were all descended from Richard Hyde I b. 1611 who immigrated to Virginia in 1635.

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  • Dear Lisa, I am so sorry I never responded to you! I think I must have made a mistake when I subscribed as I’ve never received any notifications to posts before until now.

    My bible page only lists the children of John Henry Hyde (b. 12/21/1850 in Coosa County, AL), the first born son of Hartwell Hyde. One of John Henry Hyde’s sons was named Stephen Hartwell Hyde (b. 9/14/1880) but he died at about 2 years of age.

    All of the records I can find online are for a Hartwell Hyde as well, although many people on Ancestry and FamilySearch list his as either “William” Hartwell, or Hartwell M. The only other information I have is equally confusing. I have a copy of a letter dated 1982 in which a Hyde relative names a William Hartwell Hyde, Sr. being born 12/13/1826 in AL., and died 4/25/1905 in LA. His son William Hartwell Hyde, Jr. born in 1870, died 1926 in LA.
    The second piece of information I have is a print out from the Liberty Chapel Cemetary in LA (dated 1999) that states a Hartwell M. Hyde as being born 12/13/1826 and dies 4/25/1905. So, it is very confusing to try and determine just who the father of my great grandfather, John Henry Hyde (b. 12/21/1850 in Coosa County, AL) really is.
    Thank you for the reponse above, and I will look into those variations, and also see if I have any male cousins who would be willing to do the Y test.

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    • OK – so here is what I think I know about Hartwell Hyde – to avoid confusion I will refer to your ancestor as AL Hartwell (AL for Alabama) and the “original” Hartwell Hyde as TN Hartwell. First – I would not read too much into the name Hartwell as a link between families. If you do a census search with only the first name Hartwell and no last name, you will find that Hartwell was a fairly common named in the 1700 and 1800s. Secondly, ignore family trees and Find-a-Grave entries built by others that are not well sourced – they contain many errors about these families. Here we go:

      AL Hartwell Hyde was born in Alabama (location unknown) c. 1826 (between 1825 and 1828) (1850 and later census records). He married Sarah Little in 1849 in Coosa County (marriage record). Sarah was presumably the daughter of James Little who lived next door. James was born in NC c. 1805 but apparently moved to Georgia at some point as his wife and older children were all born in Georgia. I could not locate any slave ownership records for James Little or AL Hartwell Hyde. AL Hartwell and family moved to Louisiana between 1850 and 1860 while James Little remained in Alabama.

      TN Hartwell Hyde was born in Virginia in 1759, and moved with his family into Northampton County as a child. He married and moved into Granville County, NC, for a few years before 1784 and was in Halifax County, NC, by 1786. He moved to middle Tennessee (Williamson County) in 1802 where he remained until his death in 1833. TN Hartwell had 11 children who are known – 9 daughters and 2 sons. The youngest son was named Hartwell Blount Hyde b. 1794. He named a son Hartwell Blount Hyde, Jr., b. 1832 – so neither of these men was AL Hartwell. TN Hartwell’s older son, Richard W. Hyde, was born in 1781, seems to have been single and living at home at the time of the 1800 census in Halifax County, but married about 1800/1801 to Lucy Bittle Little (her middle name was Bittle – it was not a maiden name), the daughter of William Little of Southampton County, Virginia. In 1802, Richard and Lucy conveyed land that she had inherited from her father when he died. They were living in Halifax County, NC, at the time. TN Hartwell and family, including Richard W. Hyde, moved to Williamson County, TN, in 1802. As far as records go, Richard W. Hyde only had one child – Mary T. “Polly” Hyde who married John Bostick, Jr., in Williamson County, TN, in 1815. Their oldest child was born in 1816 and the three of them appear to have been living with Richard W. Hyde and Lucy at the time of the 1820 census. The 1830 census enumerated Richard W. Hyde and Lucy without any children in the household, so we know that AL Hartwell was not their son. There don’t seem to be any detailed obituaries or records about Richard W. Hyde that would be helpful. So that leaves open a possibility – that Richard W. Hyde and Lucy had a son born c. 1802 who had left home before the 1820 census and then had a son who he named Hartwell b. 1826 in Alabama.

      So did you notice that Little last name the two families have in common? Have you ever traced your Little ancestors? Am I correct that James Little was Sarah’s father? If you can find James and his parents, perhaps it will yield a clue about AL Hartwell – as his father might have crossed paths with the Littles before they all landed in Coosa County. Richard W. Hyde’s wife was Lucy Bittle Little – daughter of William Little whose father was John Little who died in Southampton County, Virginia, in 1764. His wife was Lucy Bittle who remarried after John’s death to Simon Turner. Apparently, William Little named his daughter for his mother – which was fairly common. William Little then died Mary 29, 1794, in Southampton County, Virginia.

      I think that only the Familytree DNA BigY test will sort this out given the paucity of documents. Two descendants of different sons of TN Hartwell’s brother Henry have taken the test so there would be a match assuming that there was not a false paternity of Henry or TN Hartwell. The name Hartwell does not appear in any of the well documented descendants of Henry Hyde and none of the Hyde lines I have been able to trace moved to Alabama so I don’t think there is a match there.

      Lastly, on a possible connection to “William of Autauga” who married Charlotte Parker – William was the son of Stephen Hyde who died in Anson County, NC, before 1810. That Stephen was the son of David Hyde – uncle of Henry and Hartwell discussed above. I have not been able to trace Stephen’s son Stephen (b. 1785-1790 in Anson County, NC) after he signed a deed in Anson County in 1816 so he may have died or moved away and be the parent of another lineage.

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  • Bless your heart, Lisa! You must be a mind reader! This is EXACTLY what I am working on as we speak; the “girl next door”, Sarah Little. I am researching the Little family right now. It has been my suspicion that Sarah Little married (AL) Hartwell since I found the 1850 census shows the Hyde/Little families were neighbors. I’m so excited about everything you mentioned. I really, really appreciate your time and knowledge you have shared with me. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!! 🙂

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    • Have you found Jane Hyde in Coosa County in 1850? Her full name was Elizabeth Jane Hyde – was living with Leah Hallmark. Some folks say that Leah was mother of your Hartwell and Elizabeth Jane – that she remarried after their father died. Might be some truth there – Elizabeth Jane and her husband (the young man living with them all in 1850) moved to the same place in Louisiana as Hartwell. Some folks hook her up to a Stephen Hyde – there were lots of Stephen Hydes around. Let me know if you figure it out!

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  • Yes, I have the Stephen and Leah Hyde as a possibility of being Hartwells parents. Although, I can’t seem to find much evidence to prove any link other than the 1850 census. There is nothing else solid to confirm that Stephen and Leah Hyde were married or their children. (???) I put that on the back burned for the moment.
    I am working on the Sarah Little (AL Hartwell’s wife) lineage to see if the Little’s crossed path with the Hydes prior to Coosa County. You mentioned that Richard Hyde (1781) married a Lucy Bittle Little. So far, I have not found any documentation to support that. I see a marriage to an Elizabeth Hooper in 1815 in Tennessee. Perpaps I have overlooked a previous marriage. I am working on more research now.
    I will definitely keep you posted on these outcomes. 🙂

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    • Deed from Richard W. Hyde and wife Lucy B. Little Hyde to Robert Mabry. Deed Records of Southampton County, Virginia, Deed books, Vol. 10-11 1802-1809, pg 152.

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  • Great! I will see if I can connect the dots to the (AL) Hartwell Hyde via the Sarah Little family. I will keep you posted! Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!! 🙂

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    • To give you some notion about how wild the world of genealogy is – Hyde was not all that common of a name in the southern US in the 1700 and 1800s right? So I was looking for someone today and found a William Hyde b. 1824 in Alabama living next door to the Hooker family in Ellis County, Texas, in 1870. My grandfather’s sister married into that family. Her great great grandfather was the Henry Hyde of Nashville who was born in Virginia in 1753 and here was her future husband’s family living next door to William the son of Henry Hyde who was born in New York and moved to Alabama. Wild – right?

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  • Oh my goodness, that is wild, indeed! Sounds like you stumbled upon a bit of a needle in the haystack. I’m realizing that many of these immigrants that came to American back then were very mobile!

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  • Hello, and my apologies if this is not the right place to submit a query! I couldn’t get the subscribe link to work, unfortunately. My name is Megan Harris, and I’m trying to track down any information on my great-grandmother Eliza Hyde (1860 – 1892), who married David Remnant Harris (jr.). My grandfather lists her as having been born in London on his marriage license, and I know the family resided in Brentford, Middlesex when he was born. The only information I’ve been able to retrieve about her parents is that they may have been a Charles Hyde and a Sarah (or Alice Sarah) Smith. I’ve just always been powerfully curious about her, as her family name has persisted down the generations: my grandfather was Samuel Hyde Harris, my father was Donald Hyde Harris and my brother is Timothy Hyde Harris.

    Thanks so much for everything you do!

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