Re: John & Mary Hight of Hightstown, NJ
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In reply to:
Re: John & Mary Hight of Hightstown, NJ
Terry Campbell 4/03/04
Terry, what the DNA test would accomplish is to prove whether or not your Hight family shares a common male line ancestor with any other Hites, Hights, or Hoyts who have taken the test.As I mentioned, there are several descendants of Simon Hoyt who have taken it. There are also descendants of John Hoyt of Salisbury and Amesbury, Massachusetts who have taken it.The tests have shown that Simon and John were not related.If this gentleman you mentioned took the test and matched the descendants of Simon Hoyt, it would show that the New Jersey Hights shared a male line ancestor with Simon Hoyt's family.It would not prove that they were direct descendants of Simon Hoyt, but that would be a very likely possibility.
The test does not involve having blood drawn as many people believe.What it involves is swabbing the inside of your cheek with a small brush.You have to do it twice, waiting at least 8 hours after the first effort to do it again.You said this man is elderly.If he's in good health, it shouldn't be a problem.If his hands are shaky or anything like that, it might not be so easy for him.You can get the project rate of $169.00 for the test by having me order the kit for you.You do not have to pay until you send the kit back to the company (Family Tree DNA).
The "Earliest Ancestors" link on the Hite Family Association website notes a large number of different Hite/Hight/Hoyt ancestors from the colonial era.John Hight of Hightstown is not included, because I was not aware of any documentation of his existence.
If the middle name of your John N. Hight was, in fact, Nicholas, I would doubt that he had a brother named Nicholas.Your family could be English or German.You can look at some of my earlier exchanges with Jeff Palmer on this board to see quite a bit of discussion on the New Jersey Hights.I lean toward English origins.There was a Samuel Haight on Long Island who died there in 1712, leaving land in "West Jersey" to three sons.This Samuel was a descendant of Simon Hoyt.However, there was a Nicolaus Heyd (a German) who arrived in New York in 1710 and later had three children baptized in the German Reformed Church in Somerville, NJ, including a son Henrich, baptized in 1716.So there are different possibilities.The fact that your family was Baptist suggests English origins.Another key is to look at the nationalities of people in the areas where they lived.You are not likely to find a lone German among large numbers of English or vice-versa.