Week 35: Free Space (52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks)

Amy Johnson Crows’ Week 35's theme is "Free Space." I intended for this to be a week for you to choose whatever you want to write about. (Though that's true every week!) But also feel free to riff off of the theme -- maybe an ancestor who went West for land, going to a family vacation spot, or a bingo-playing ancestor? Have fun with this theme! Click here to check out all the themes for 2022.

This week I have decided to write about a family line I am struggling with. Since I have a dedicated blog for my Hilts/Hiltz branch, I have decided this is where I will write this week's post.

My maternal grandmother was a Hiltz. I am able to trace her line back relatively easy for a few generations. A cousin many, many years ago, created a site on “MyFamily” for the Hilts/Hiltz of the United States and Canada. She gave me what my line back to our common immigrant ancestor is. The problem, I am unable to prove this line. I can prove the children of our immigrant ancestor and a few generations going down, I can prove my Maternal grandmother up a few generations, however it’s the generations in the middle that causing me problems.

I have lots of DNA matches to Hilts/Hiltz descendants. However, according to the tree my cousin created, these matches should be more remotely related, I don’t understand why we have so much shared DNA. 

Another problem was a book my cousin mentioned titled “Godfrey Hilts and his Canadian Descendants” compiled by Charlotte Hilts Steele and Harry Doner. I wanted to get my hands on a copy of this book and no one seemed to have one. Luckily, the Family History Library in Salt Lake City had one and I was able to view it and take pictures of the pages for my reference. The University of Wisconsin also has a copy of this book and now that I relocated back to my home state, I was able to reference the book again for pages that were a little blurry from my picture taking.

This book is about the descendants of Godfrey Hilts and Maria Miller. First thing I noticed is that Godfrey and Maria birth and death dates were very similar to my Lorentz Hiltz and Maria Miller. My Lorentz Hiltz supposedly married twice, first to Maria and then to Barbara. What always puzzled me was my Lorentz Hilts, who was a revolutionary patriot and according to his Pension record, he only had two sons, Lorentz and Christian. However, my tree has 7 children by the two wives. 

The book doesn’t have Godfrey Hilts parents listed, however my inherited tree has him as the son of Christofel Hilts. Also, a lot of my DNA matches appear to be descendants of Godfrey Hilts and thus this makes me wonder if my branch is in the wrong place. 

Another book I have been referencing is “Early Families of Herkimer County New York, Descendants of the Burnetsfield Palatines” written by William V.H. Barker. This book also has Godfrey and his wife Maria along with my Lorentz Hilts with the two wives. This might be where my cousin found her original information.  

Perhaps my Hilts/Hiltz DNA comes from a case of two Hilts/Hiltz descendants marrying and I descend from this relationship. 

One thing I know for certain; Godfrey and My Lorentz Hilts are not the same person. Lorentz and Barbara were sponsors for Godfrey’s son, Stophel.

Every time I revisit this branch, my head hurts, my eyes get blurry and the room starts to spin. Seriously, this puzzle is one that keeps me up at night because I know the answer is some where among the books, the documents, the DNA matches and I just can’t seem to see it. It doesn’t help that they keep repeating names. 

I am going to stop complaining here and go back to looking at this puzzle a little more.

Remember to have fun and Just do Genealogy!