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Notes: Over the years, I have interlineated THE HILLS FAMILY IN AMERICA (HFIA) w ith my notes and research for this family. I have used the HFIA format a nd information in doing so but have included additional sources and oth er information. This piece incorporates and expands upon information fr om Winifred Lovering Holman's DESCENDENTS OF SAMUEL HILLS 1957. Where a name appears with an alphabetical identifier that person does ( may) not appear in HFIA. An individual may appear in multiple places- g randfather, father or children's entry. Comments, corrections, more inf ormation and records are appreciated. I have included information from disputing sources and my own belief wh ere I have investigated the evidence for a family. Some of my thinking i s different from well know genealogists. While I respect their work, I b elieve that each of us has the obligation to examine the basis for the i nformation of any authority; and if that basis is wanting, to exercise i ndependent judgment. We do have sources available to us and means of re search that past family researchers could hardly imagine. In many cases , I have simply presented information from various sources, leaving it u p to the reader to make a decision. Some of the listed links are broken but original sources are listed. A v ersion number is used to indicate changes have been made. There is also a d ate at the end showing the last date entries were made. Version 44- At page 5 THE HILLS FAMILY IN AMERICA 1906 (HFIA) William Sanford Hills a nd Thomas Hills 3 John2 (William1) b Hartford Conn abt 1648; d (buried at E. Hartford, A pril 5, 1692). Married at Saybrook, Middlesex Co., Conn; April 14, 1670 J ane Bushnell. Children of John and Jane (Bushnell) Hills: 19 Samuel b Saybrook, May 29, 1671; d before Oct 22, 1753 20 A daughter 21 A daughter Jonathan Hill, aged 28 and Dorothy Hill age 25 testified 1 Sept 1692 th at during brother John Hill last sickness he said that when debts were p aid his wife should enjoy all the estate for life and what was left at h er decease should be divided equally between his two daughters. Invento ry taken 20 Aug 1692 by Thomas Kilbourn and Samuel Welles; 45 pounds 10 s hillings and 6 pence (Manwaring). Net estate was some 31 pounds. Notes: HFIA states that it had 4 records for John - freeman status in 1 699, received property in 1677 -about 31 acres- and 1683- about 20 acre s- by gift of his father, marriage in 1670 and probate of 1692. In the 1901 report of the Hills Family Association, it was stated: "... a somewhat lengthly statement of facts were given that almost conc lusively proves that a Samuel Hills whose birth was unquestionably born i n 1671 was the same person whose birth was of record in Saybrook [son o f John Hills and Jane the widow Bushnell Hills] as of that date; that h is surname and that of his son Samuel was Hills was proved beyond a dou bt, and their descendents of modern times are so designated." HFIA shows that his father William remarried twice more following the d eath of his first wife Fillis/Phillis Lyman. There were 2 full blooded s iblings - Sarah and William- by the first marriage. There were addition al half brothers and sisters from the subsequent marriages and stepchil dren from the earlier marriages of the two stepmothers. Other records for John- The Winthrop Medical records (pages 88 and 149) place him born about 16 44, rather than the 1648 of HFIA. Some researchers place his birth befo re 1640 but without proof, relying instead on the marriage of his paren ts abt 1632 and the natural birth order, with John being the last known c hild of William and Fillis (Lyman) Hills. Other than the Winthrop recor ds, there are no records of the ages of these three children. His mothe r Fillis was reported to have been sickly and to have gone deaf as a re sult of her illnesses - Rev John Eliott's journal. His parents married a bout 1632 and do not show an expected pattern for birth of children- pe rhaps due to Fillis/Phillis' illness. The marriage shows in Torrey's NEW ENGLAND MARRIAGES BEFORE 1700. Jane B ushnell is listed as widow of John Bushnell who then married John Hills . Also in "Francis Bushnell of Guilford. Conn and His Descendants", com piled by RD Smith and communicated by Bernard C Steiner NEGHS Register V ol 53, April 1899 page 208-214. The Bushnell genealogy THE DESCENDENTS O F WILLIAM BUSHNELL lists Jane the widow of John Bushell having married J ohn Hill(s) of Saybrook and having three children: Samuel and two unkno wn daughters. HFIA notes that Jane's maiden name and birth date was not i dentified. Saybrook records show a marriage to Jane Bushnell in April 1670 and the b irth of a son Samuel in May 1671. Vol 1 page 42 of Saybrook town records record his purchase of a "..home and home lote of 1 acre and a quarter from Edward Codner, along w ith 3 acres of land in the planting field and 2 acres of meadow at Rage d Rock 16 Nov 1670" The same record reports "John Hills marke 1670 that he puts upon his cattle is a crop upon the t ope of each ear and a slott cut down in the crop of the near ear." He sold his Saybrook property (page 54 Saybrook deeds) 27th February 16 75 to a Mr. Bellamy. "Bought of John Hill his house and home lot consisting of one ack more o r loss gining (lying) and being in the towne of Say Brook bounded by Jo hn Westall on the east and William Southmaid on the north the highway w est and the meeting commons on the South also 2 acres of meadow lying o n the north side of William Dudley and John Clark. And also my disteden t (dividend) land at Pataqunk with all privileges belonging thereunt as d oth more fully appear in a deed of sale under the said Hills hand beari ng date with this record." Shows as having served in King Philips War 1675-1677 (SOLDIERS IN KING P HILIPS WAR 1675 by George M Dodge, Boston 1903 pages 51-53) citing to J ohn Hull's account book of Capt Daniel Henchman's Company. Listed as ha ving received a land grant for that service - location not known. Fort S aybrook itself was besieged in King Philip's War with much of the area d estroyed. Probate records of the estate of John Bushnell from Suffolk Co., Mass i nclude orders dated 29 Jan 1677-78 (Pub Col Soc 30:885 relating to real e state and rents for a property in Boston) directed to Jane the relic Bu shnell state that she returned to Saybrook to the home of her parents a nd later married John or James Hill(s). Those probate records show Jane r eceived 85-90 pounds as her "thirds". The probate includes other record s indicating that one of the children of John and Jane Bushnell was "ap prenticed" to avoid being a charge to the town. The probate was reopene d again in 1685 following the death of William Bushnell in Saybrook in 1 684. William was 17 years old at his death. John sold part of his Hartford lands 21 Jan 1679 to Henry Arnold and mo re of those lands at a date unknown but prior to 1692 to a Thomas Goodf ellow. He is listed in the probate of his father's estate in 1683. By that pro bate, he received land- about 20 acres- from his father's Hosmore prope rty in Hoccanum, (East Hartford) Conn. The inventory of John Hills's estate (Vol 5 page 133 Hartford Probate R ecords) is listed: To his wearing clothes m & u 2=00=00 To 2- 3 yr old steer 5=10=00 to a cow 3=10=00 to 12 yr old heifer 2=00=00 to 16 sheep & lambs 4=00=00 to 8 swine 5=00=00 to pewter 12 and brass 10 1=02=00 to 1 pot and pot hooke 0=12=00 to a box and hickery? 0=03=00 to a table & two chests 0=12=00 to old wheels 2 0=02=00 to featherbed, bolster 2 pillows covering and all 4=00=00 to bed ticking 0=00=00 to 5 old bags 0=06=00 to old barrells 0=05=00 to linins 30 n to wool 12 n 2=02=00 to flax and tow yarns 0=15=00 to Indian corn & oates 0=08=00 to a sine1 and rope 2 0=03=00 to 1 gun powder & bullets 1=00=00 to land 10=00=00 to a testament 0=02=06 45=10=06 In account of what debts is to be paid out of the estate- Thomas Loveland 01=09=00 Thomas Kilburn 00=11=02 Mr Willson 01=01=00 Mr Way 00=10=00 Mr gilbert 01=04=10 for coffin 00=10=00 Mr Gorman 01=03=00 Benj Csari? 00=12=00 Doctor E Hooker 01=16=06 Goodwife Clerk 00=05=00 NathL Smith 00=05=00 Andrew Robre? 03=03=00] Joseph Rowland Jr 00=05=00 Joseph Hill 01=05=00 Jonathan Hill 02=04=06 August 20, 1692 Thomas Kilburn Samuel Wells Below that appears the following listing: One steer 2 year old 2=00=00 One cow 2 year old 2=00=00 one calfe 1 year old 1=10=00 to Wm Hill 0=19=00 John Hill had on wearing clothers 2=05=00 to Nath Goodwire 1=04=00 payd to Mr Gilbert 1=00=00 to the country (rate) 1=00=00 to Mr Wilson 1=10=00 to Samuel Emons 1=10=00 Total 14=09=00 The net estate appears to be 31 pounds 1 shilling and 6 pence. (FHL fil m #4550) The current value of this estate is somewhere between $600 and $ 800 dollars. It is worth noting that the inventory does not include a h ome or home lot. The animals in the estate could have been free roaming i n common areas or in the streets of East Hartford at the time. Ownershi p would have been proven by ear marks. It is possible there was propert y elsewhere not subject to this probate. He signed deeds and left a tes tament. Virtually all these entries illustrate the very common problem in doing H ills/Hill research. The name is often written interchangeably with and w ithout the "S" and in spelling variations. The probate of John Hills sh ows the name as Hill, despite the fact that all the individuals named a re connected to the William Hills family of Hartford, Conn. Savage in h is Genealogical Dictionary notes that this family insisted on the final " S" in their name. HFIA put all its information in a wide public challenge asking all doub ters to come forth to challenge its conclusions on the Hills genealogy. N o one challenged HFIA and its evidence for John and Jane (the relic Bus hnell) Hills until Donald Lines Jacobus: "...The name of the second wife of Thomas Adkins (Josiah1) is not menti oned in his probate but on 19 Jan. 1698/9 "Mary Adkins Widdow" relingui shed all right in land which Thomas Kilbourn had purchased 1 November 1 698 from William Buckland and Elizabeth his wife [Conn. Hist. Society C ollections 14:248-9]. Kilbourn's wife was a sister of John Hills, and h e had already added to his holdings land which had belonged to John Hil ls. Since Hills had died in 1692 leaving a widow and two daughters, it a ppears likely that the sale was made by his daughter and her husband, a nd that the widow Mary Adkins who relinquished her right in the land wa s the widow of John Hills. We do not know of any Adkins widow in 1698/9 e xcept the widow of Thomas Adkins who had died in 1694." "The Josiah Adk ins Family Of Connecticut" by Donald Lines Jacobus Tag Vol 33, 1957 pag e 245. In his HALE HOUSE AND RELATED FAMILIES OF THE CONNETICUT RIVER VALLEY, M r. Jacobus footnote 1 page 582 adds: "1. He [John} was not the John Hill who m at Saybrook 14 Apr. 1670 Jane B ushnell, widow of John Bushnell (1615-1667), a woman of probably over 4 0 years of age by whom he had one child, Samuel b at Saybrook 29 May 16 71. The Hills Family In America (1906) errs in this identification. Joh n of (East) Hartford shows in his provision for wife and two daughters t hat he had no surviving male issue. The alleged son Samuel was just und er the age of 21 when John Hills died and would not have been cut off w ithout mention in his nuncupative will." The Buckland purchase and subsequent release by Mary Adkins shows in Ha rtford Proprietor Records 1639-1688 page 260 (FHL film #4510) "One parcel of land which he (Thomas Kilborne) purchased of Wm Buckland a nd Eliza his wife lying on the East side of the Connectictott River, be ing 8 rod and half in bredth abutting West on Richard Blanchard's land, N orth on Joseph Henry, South on Richard Keeny and East on land of Ebenez er Hills as may appear on his deed dated the 1st day of November 1698, a cknowledged the day before Wm Pitkin, Asst (Recorded Jan 19, 1698 (sic) ) Mary Adkins, widdow, relinquished all rights, title, claim or interest t o the above mentioned parcel of land does fully consent to the sale the reof as appears by writing under her hand and seal witnessed by Tho Ens yne and Samll Peck." Mr Jacobus concludes that "Elizabeth was the heiress of this land and t hat Mary Adkins was her mother, signing off her dower right." He does n ot provide a record showing such an inheritance. He clearly appears not t o understand dower rights. There has been no published response to the Jacobus position by any res earcher. The editor and compiler of HFIA were long deceased by the time o f HALE HOUSE. It should be noted right off that John Hills' will of 1692 did not leav e his unnamed daughters anything directly. Their rights to any estate a sset were contigent on their mother not using up such asset and on thei r outliving their mother. Lands given to their mother by the probate we re given in life estate with a right to invade principal and not limite d to dower rights. The will itself is incompatible with the Jacobus the ory of both mother and daughter being alive at the same time and with a d aughter owning an estate asset. Jacobus clearly must overcome a major hurdle, given the 1692 oral will, t o find anything beyond his "appears likely". Mr. Jacobus ended up with " extra", leftover and unknown Hills in his work, indicating his research p roblems for the Hills family. His Hills research was challenged and alt ered in part by the recent Anderson work THE GREAT MIGRATION BEGINS. Ot hers have also refuted or rewritten some of his Hills claims and "sugge stions". See Mrs. White 1959 TAG article. Mrs. Winifred Lovering Holman in DESCENDENTS OF SAMUEL HILLS also takes t he Jacobus position, citing his "very careful work", although she admit s that she finds "no proof" despite "exhaustive research". At page 1 "S amuel Hills, birth place and parentage, unknown, aged sixty-two in 1735 , hence born in 1673..." Mrs Holman claims that HFIA was "sans evidence " on the matter. The land (1698/9) in question, acccording to research of Gale Ion Harri s (TAG 69:174-183 (1994)) may have been purchased by a William1 Bucklan d prior to his death in 1691 from Thomas Olcott and gifted to their son W illiam2 by the widow Elizabeth (Williams) Buckland (Hartford Deeds 1:30 4) rather than part of a 1692 probate or any other connection for John H ills. Alternatively, such property was otherwise purchased by a relic Elizabe th Buckland or was otherwise part of the estate of William1 Buckland. T here is no other known source of land for this William2 Buckland or his w ife apparent from early Hartford deed records. Elizabeth (Williams?) Buckland's deed of 3 June 1698 is as follows; "Know by all men by these presents that I Elizabeth Buckland widdow of t he colony of Connecticott and township of Hartford for divers good caus e and consideration ... but especially naturale love to my son William B uckland of the colony of Connecticott and county of Hartford aforementi oned have given, granted, and confirmed and do by these presents give, g rant and confirm unto him the sd William Buckland, his heirs Excutors a dministrators or assignes one piece or parcel of upland that I bought o f Mr Aaron Cook being and lying on the East side of the Connectictott R iver and is in the township of Hartford that is to say that part of sai d lot that lyeth East of the county highway be it more or less as to nu mber of acres abbutting west on the county highway south on the lands o f John Goodwin north on a parcel of land that my husband William Buckla nd had bought of Thomas Olcott as by a deed will appear and East on lan d of Mr William Pitkin and one piece of boggy or low land being the wes t end of that lott that I bought of Mr Aaron Cook to begin at the uplan d land and forward westward till it meet with the Swamp or Meadow lotts b e it more or less to the number of acres abutting the southern end of N athaniel Goodwin Jr and is on the meadow or Swamp East on the uplands a butting of Elizabeth Buckland, and north on lands belonging to the sd E lizabeth Buckland sometimes belonging to Thomas Olcott." I should note that there is a dispute about whether William1 Buckland's w ife was Elizabeth Williams or yet someone else, perhaps Elizabeth Hill. According to Dr. Harris, William1 Buckland was a speculator in East Har tford lands. He lived next door to his father-in-law William Williams. H is sisters-in-law included Jane, the first wife of Thomas Adkins. In ad dition to Jane and Elizabeth, there were two additional Williams sister s-Mary and Ruth. It is within the bounds of speculation that sister Mary Williams may ha ve been Thomas Adkins' second wife or a wife of some other Adkins. Dr H arris believes otherwise, relying on a series of unconnected references t o place her as a wife of a much traveled William Briggs; but offers no c onclusive proof these references refer to the same person. An issue that often arises in researching early individuals is the repe tition of the same given names in the same families in the same areas. I t seems that such individuals were distinguished from one another by va rious references as senior or junior or by use of a nickname or other m eans. The individual may not have been called by a legal name for much o f that person's life, including in legal records. Early records, as wel l, often have errors, using family name variations. The English languag e was far more flexible in regards to spelling and other matters than t he modern written language. It is also possible that Thomas Adkins' second wife could have been a d aughter or stepdaughter of John Hills rather than his widow. Or again a d aughter or stepdaughter of John could have been the wife of some Adkins n ot known to Mr. Jacobus. However, nothing is recorded of these girls ev en if they, in fact, were his natural children. Stepchildren, as a cust om of the time, could have been treated the same as natural children. O r Jane Bushnell may have obligated her husband by a marriage contract t o treat certain of her children by John Bushnell as John Hills' own for i nheritance purposes. Such a contract would have been common for a prope rtied widow of that day. The possibilities of one sister releasing an interest in property sold b y another may make the most sense from a purely legal point of view. Su ch an event would explain the lack of other records that presumably wou ld support a distribution from an estate or for various other reasons- i ncluding a dower release. However, the sisters could be either Williams , Bushnell. Adkins, Buckland, Cook, Olcott or Hills or some unknown par ties. In addition to these possibilities, a purchaser of an "expectancy" or a d ebt holder as well as an heir of an estate, are other possible explanat ions that could explain a release of rights by a widow Mary Adkins in 1 698-1699. All are legitimate sources of claims against a property. A quit claim deed is a very broad legal tool used to resolve any and al l potential claims of whatever sort imaginable impacting land titles. B ut a quit claim deed by itself will not necessarily explain the nature o f the claim released. The effect of not being able to determine the source of Mary Adkins cla im to the 1698/1699 Buckland property is that Mr. Jacobus' theory of mo ther and daughter has to be considered suspect. Further it appears the wife of a William Buckland who was a Hills may h ave been a grandniece rather than a daughter to John Hills who had died p rior to her birth. Various records list Elizabeth Hills of Longmeadow M ass as the wife of William3 not William2 Buckland. This Elizabeth is li sted as a daughter of John Hills and his wife Margaret of Longmeadow, M ass rather than John Hills of Saybrook and Hartford. The grave stone fo r William2 Buckland lists his age as 90 years old in 1724. There is muc h about this couple that simply does not add up in the face of various r ecords, suggesting that perhaps two or more different couples of the sa me name may be confused in the records. There is another line of research here that makes the issue yet more co nfusing. There are genealogies for the Easton family (William Starr Eas ton DESCENDANTS OF JOSEPH EASTON, HARTFORD,CO 1636-1899) and Butler Fam ily (THE BUTLER GENEALOGY by Ormand Butler Tuttle & Co., Rutland Vt 193 4 also references the Easton family records) tracing the ancestry of Le muel Easton who married in 1754 Elizabeth Buckland, the daughter of Eli zabeth Hills and William3 Buckland. Likewise SPENCER FAMILY RECORDS Wil liam Henry Spencer, TA Wright Publisher 1907. Those family records agre e this Elizabeth (?) Buckland was the daughter of John Hills and Margar et Dix of Longmeadow, Mass; while her husband William3 was the son of W illiam2 Buckland and an Elizabeth Hill (not Hills) daughter of Luke Hil l and Mary Hoyt. The 1906 Buckland Family Reunion had a paper read by t he Rev Frank Gardener, its president, also repeating that Elizabeth Hil ls was the wife of William3 Buckland not William2 as argued by Mr Jacob us and Mrs. Holman. The Forbes family similarly record conflicts about t heir connections to an Elizabeth Hills Buckland. It is of more than passing interesting that some 4 or 5 different famil ies make a claim through to a John Hills by way of his unknown daughter s. None can be regarded as proven, however, due to conflicting records. T here are records of such disputes going back to early NEGHS "Register" a rticles and to the Stiles work on early families of Connecticut without a r esolution. There have been no primary sources located by any researcher t o resolve these various claims. The timing of a number of these claims i s long after the death of John Hills b ca 1644 and died 1692. If one assumes for argument sake that John Hills of Saybrook had a daug hter Elizabeth through a second wife named Mary, it was likely such Eli zabeth was less than 14 years old in 1698-99 and girls of that age rare ly married in early colonial times. That conclusion is based on being u nable to explain away records of John, his wife Jane, son Samuel and st epson William in Saybrook but not anything of daughters in that town's r ecords up to 1685. Factually, there is no marriage record of any wife M ary, or birth record of any daughters of such a wife or daughters for a ny wife for this John Hills in Hartford, Saybrook or anywhere else. It is conceiveable that the two girls referenced in his oral will of 16 92 were John's stepdaughters rather than his own children. Jane the rel ic Bushnell had a daughter Elizabeth b 30 Aug 1657 with John Bushnell a mong other daughters by him: Dorothy b 1651, Sarah b 1653 and Jane b 16 62. Elizabeth Bushnell reportedly died in 1662 in Boston but daughters J ane and Sarah were still living at the time of John Hills' death. Oral wills, in the case of the early Hills families, and even written w ills have often failed to provide proof of heirs. The custom of the tim e was for lifetime gifts of an estate to an heir. Such an individual wo uld then be omitted from the subsequent will. John Hills, himself, rece ived a lifetime gift from his father, representing a share in his fathe r's estate. John Hills' sale of his Hartford properties in 1679 and later may refle ct such a lifetime gift to an heir. Given that prior provision may have b een made for an heir and the small size of the estate, it is not surpri sing that an heir would be omitted from John's probate. In fact the sma ll estate tends to indicate that probably some provision had been made f or an heir prior to John's death. William Hills Sr.'s will made such pr ovision for certain of his sons mandatory. The absence of an heir is al so suggestive that there is a difference in blood relation to the liste d heirs as well as that the omitted heir may have lived elsewhere. Oral wills are not reliable and today are not allowed by most states ex cept for a military exception. The 1693 oral will of John's brother Wil liam omitted heirs and was called "incomplete" by the court, additional h eirs were added to those in the oral will of 1693. William Hills Sr's 1 683 written will omitted heirs added by the court. Other examples can b e readily cited for the Hills and other families of the time. Such will s are considered to have limited probative value by courts. The legal c oncern is that they are being made at a time when an individual's mind i s not clear due to illness or medical treatment; and made when an indiv idual may be open to undue influence from caretakers. Mr. Jacobus himse lf clearly does not believe that John's 1692 will was correct since his t heory of heiresses is so at odds with the plain language of the oral wi ll. During the summer of 2003, I engaged in correspondence and email with D r. Gale Ion Harris who believes that Jacobus was correct as to Mary and E lizabeth but agrees there is no supporting evidence for the theory. He b elieves two different properties are involved rather than only one as a s ource of property for William2 Buckland in the 1698-99 Buckland sale to T homas Kilborn. Clearly there is some issue as to the description of nei ghbors in the Buckland deed of 1698-99 when compared to the description f or Elizabeth Buckland's earlier deed. However, Dr Harris is unaware of a ny record of such additional land and was unable to advise of a possibl e means to locate property records that could support his belief. It should be noted that, according to Dr. Harris, William2 Buckland of 1 698-99 was probably not more than 21-23 years old with a wife who was p robably a minor. He was one of a number of heirs to an insolvent estate a nd no major property owner. He left a small estate to his heirs and was a w eaver by trade. In other words he started with little and had little in t he way of material goods and lands during his lifetime. Moreover, the first three volumes of deeds for Hartford covering the ye ars 1678 to 1732 record only one sale by William Buckland and his wife " Eliza" to Thomas Kilborne who was meticulous in recording his many land t ransactions, usually referencing any connection to the Hills family in h is recorded deeds. Such land records show only one pre- 1698/99 acquisi tion of land by Mr Buckland- the gift from his mother. Perhaps, he sepa rately inherited from his father; but there is no record of an earlier d eed from the estate to William2 Buckland. There is no record of an "Eli za" Buckland, wife of William2 Buckland, among the pre-1698 land record s of Hartford, except in connection with this one transaction. Further, John Hills only owned two pieces of property in the Hartford a rea that are recorded- 31 acres received by his father's gift in 1677 a nd smaller acreage received by his father's will in 1683; and he made s ales from these properties in 1679 and again sometime between 1680 and 1 692. None of the properties previously sold to either Arnold or Goodfel low would fit Jacobus's theory of a legacy to a daughter subject to a d ower of a wife. The estate lands also don't fit the Jacobus theory sinc e they were not subject to dower. Mr. Jacobus does not provide any reco rd of any land that does fit his theory. It thus appears more Hartford property is being assigned by Jacobus to J ohn's ownership than can be accounted for by actual records. Certainly J ohn's estate inventory reflects only ownership of undeveloped land and a s mall amount of that. Moreover, that land was given as a life estate wit h a right to invade principal by his unnamed wife, rather than to the u nnamed daughters with the wife retaining dower. I have found no record i ndicating what happened to such estate land. But there is also no recor d of any direct gift or legacy by John to any child where his widow wou ld have had dower rights. Mr. Jacobus speculates as to "dower" rights in land that was sold by an h eiress. But he doesn't provide a source of that estate nor present a wi ll or any other record giving "Elizabeth" that land. His theory is not c onsistent with the actual 1692 will of John Hills. In fact, there is so me reason to question whether he is even correct on the name of Thomas A dkin's widow based on Manwarring's Probate Records of Connecticut who s ays the relic's name was Elizabeth rather than Mary. The land given by his mother Elizabeth in June 1698 to William2 Bucklan d was not property from John Hills' estate and was not land John Hills e ver owned. Hartford Deed Records from 1678 -1732 and the Proprietor rec ords from 1639-1688 show no Hills - Cook or Olcott transaction of any s ort. Mr Olcott was one of the original Hartford proprietors and had his o wn rights to town lands. The Thomas Kilbourn recording of the 1698-99 release by Mary Adkins ref erences on the same page of Hartford deeds a second parcel that Thomas K ilbourn bought of a Thomas Goodfellow who earlier bought the property f rom John Hills. But the Buckland property itself is not linked to eithe r the Goodfellow purchase or otherwise specifically described as being p roperty ever owned by John Hills. The deed to the Goodfellow purchase w as just recorded at the same time, probably as a simple matter of conve nience. The Goodfellow property was not part of John's estate either si nce the deed shows a sale by John himself. (See Hartford Deeds Vol 1-3 F HL microfilm 4511 and Proprietor Records 1639-1688 FHL film #4510). Per haps the single recording on the same page and date lead to an unwarran ted assumption by Mr. Jacobus. Sgt. Kilbourn/Kilburn was a substantial p roperty owner in East Hartford and elsewhere and bought properties from n umerous individuals, including from several of his brothers in laws. Dr. Harris also refers to sloppy legal practice of the times to account f or there being no record (gift, deed or probate) of a land transfer by t he alleged Hills widow to the alleged heiress; or accounting of the int erest of the unnamed second daughter; or of any effort to protect the i nterest of the probable minor wife Eliza. It should be noted that John' s daughters are contigent heirs- their unnamed mother had the sole righ t to spend all of John's estate as she wished, including the right to l eave nothing for the unnamed daughters. It also should be noted that do wer rights are not inheritable but are extinguished on the death of a w ife. Dower is automatically extinguished by a wife receiving property f rom a husband. A dower is a lesser right than outright ownership of a p roperty. Mr. Jacobus's case for Elizabeth and Mary rests on something other than a p lain reading of John's 1692 will. But no proof is ever presented for th e theory. We have only "it appears likely". The theory has too many una swered questions to be accepted at face value without some corroboratio n or answer to the questions that the theory and the circumstances rais e. Dr. Harris warns against reading too much into the records. It has to b e asked if Mr. Jacobus did so? On the face of the deed and release, no r elationship of any kind is set forth by the parties to one another or t o Mrs. Adkins. There is no specific statement that Mary Adkins was the m other of William2 Buckland, his wife Eliza or anyone else; or any refer ence that the land being sold was part of any estate; or subject to dow er rights. There is no statement as to how the Buckland sellers obtaine d the property being sold; or of its prior ownership. There is no refer ence to the name of Mary Adkins' husband. The deed records of Hartford s eemingly provide only the single gift by Elizabeth Buckland to William2 B uckland as a source of property that he might have sold in 1698/99. The 1 691 probate record of William1 Buckland sugggests that perhaps William2 m ight have received land from the estate; but that estate was insolvent, h aving debts greater than assets, according to the inventory. Additional ly, William2 was a minor at that time of his father's death. There is n o record of any sort as to how "Eliza" Buckland might have obtained lan d in her own maiden name whatever it might be. I have been advised the issues involve fraud rather than simple malprac tice for the transaction described by Mr. Jacobus to make sense. Mr Kil bourn would have been defrauded unless William2 Buckland had good title t o sell in 1698. William Buckland's good deed means Mary Adkins did not h ave title and had no title to give to her alleged "heir" at the time of t he sale. Exactly what is the nature of Mary Adkins claim, and what was r eleased is unknown; but it was certainly less than legal title. Further , she could not have released a dower right if she had previously given l and subject to her dower right away or if she had inherited the subject l and from her husband. In both instances, dower rights would have automa tically expired by law. Dr. Harris argues we cannot judge legal practice of the 1600's by curre nt standards. I have difficulty with the transaction as described by Mr J acobus and view as outrageous an argument that malpractice and fraud wa s accepted in those times. Moreover, it seems to me that a currently pr acticing attorney is at least as qualified to express an expert opinion a bout a legal transaction from 1698-99 as is a practicing 2003 genealogi st. Record of that exchange appears elsewhere on this site. I would als o note that land was the major source of wealth in early colonial Ameri ca and that issues concerning land were regularly litigated and of comm on knowledge. I would also note that legal practice of those days may n ot be what is current but that it must be considered at least adequate. G eneral legal principles for real estate are much the same today as in 1 698. Review of Buckland genealogy reveals they too rely on Mr. Jacobus's lea p into the unknown for an identification of William2 Buckland and of hi s wife, the second of a series of five William Bucklands with a wife El iza/Elizabeth. This is a line of fairly obscure individuals who left no g reat amount of records. A Nutmegger article clearly written after the J acobus claims merely repeats them (Connecticut Nutmegger Vol 3 1970 pag es 20-25 reporting records of a Captain Olmstead. This article has clea r conflicts with the Buckland Family Association records referenced ear lier and does not present any supporting information for the genealogy. The Bushnell genealogies do not appear to be satisfactory in locating t he Jane Bushnell or Jane the relic Bushnell who married John Hills. The y suggest her return to Saybrook after the death of John Bushnell indic ates there is a relationship with the Saybrook Bushnells, although the S uffolk Co., Mass. probate records state she returned to her family in S aybrook- not his. The Jane identified by them would seem to be too old, a t least 12 or more years older than John Hills in 1670. Although some a uthorities do list John as born in 1644 rather than the 1648 of HFIA (a nd others have him born before 1640), he would still be apparently much y ounger than Jane whose marriage to John Bushnell is reported to have oc curred in 1650. Presumably Jane was at least 18 years old at the 1650 m arriage date with John Bushnell. However, we in fact have no records of e ither her maiden name, birth date or age. While there are rare instance s of girls in their early teens having married in early Colonial Americ a, most such marriages took place in England usually prior to emigratio n. For the record, women in their thirties and forties still give birth t o children. An older bride for John may well lend support to the idea o f a small immediate family with stepchildren being treated as his own. In Appendix C of HFIA, reference is made to a March 27, 1747 deposition m ade in Lebanon for a Suffolk County Mass. case by Samuel Hills, John's p utative son, spelling out his origins and listing his age as 76 years o ld, again showing a birth in about 1671, and stating that he had lived i n Duxbury, Plymouth Colony approximately 20 years earlier. While no spe cific case reference is given to enable this researcher to locate this d eposition, there is no reason to believe that it was misrepresented. Th is Samuel is clearly identified in this deposition and in numerous othe r public records as a Hills and his father was therefor a Hills. This r ecord clearly indicates that there was a Hills with a child Samuel born i n about 1671. The only match from early New England records is to Samue l the son of John and Jane (the relic Bushnell) Hills of Saybrook. It thus appears HFIA had a substantial record, including support in vit al, court, public and church records, for its conclusions on the parent age of Samuel Hills in marked contrast to Mr. Jacobus' "appears likely" a nd Mrs. Holman's "opinion" but "no proof". Mr. Jacobus has a way of developing theories on assumptions. He takes a n assumption as fact and then creates new cloth out of the original pre mise. He often makes suggestions and later treats his suggestions as pr oven facts. At times his system offers valuable insight and fruitful avenues for ne w research. Admittedly, this can lead to primary records and explain se condary records. Most of us similarly start research from a theory whic h we then prove or disprove. But here the 1698-9 Adkins release simply has nothing to do on its face w ith John Hills. While Mr Jacobus says he did a careful reading of metes a nd bounds, he offers no proof of title for the land. His theory is inco nsistent with John's 1692 oral will. Thomas Kilbourn had other non-Hill s sources for his properties. The 1698-9 deed lacks the customary refer ence found in Kilbourn's deeds that reflect his purchase of property th at had belonged to the Hills family. Subsequent researchers had found n o proof to support Mr. Jacobus' theory. The unknown Mary Adkins received an unknown something from her unknown h usband whoever he was. Perhaps she was a second or third wife and had d ower from an earlier husband as well. But there is nothing that positiv ely identifies her as the John Hills's widow, who was left a life estat e with a right to invade principal. There is no corroboration of any so rt for the theory. Legally, the widow Hills would be the seller of any real estate interes t in the John Hills estate. Her dower rights to such estate lands would h ave expired in such estate land by force of law. The release does not m ention dower rights or any other specific rights. Mary Adkins clearly would have no rights in another man's (William1 Buc kland) lands who died a year earlier than her husband and to whom there a re no apparent family connections. Moreover, it is disturbing that William2 Buckland's wife's name appears a s "Eliza" rather than the Elizabeth represented by Mr. Jacobus in the B uckland-Kilbourn 1698-99 deed. Without something more in the way of cor roboration, the Jacobus claim is nothing but circular reasoning in conf lict with numerous public records. If Mary was a second wife, she had no dower rights to lands John had so ld before her marriage. Apparently, most of his Hartford lands were sol d circa 1679-1690. A second wife and any children would have no rights i n lands that John had sold prior to his death. There is no record in Jo hn's recorded deeds of any reservation of dower rights by any wife and n o record shows he had a wife named Mary. There is no complete record of w hen John disposed of all land received from his father, although Mr. Ja cobus appears to believe all of John's lands were sold before his death i n 1692. There is no record that John otherwise acquired property in Har tford, except as a result of gifts from his father. Dr Harris raises the possibility of a gift by Mary Adkins to the heires s Elizabeth of Hills estate land. This is a very different legal event f rom Mr. Jacobus' dower right argument. Dr Harris believes that Mr. Jaco bus was unaware that John's estate held any land which may explain a th eory contrary to the probate record. But a gift of land by a Mary Adkin s, if she were John's heir, would legally extinguish all of her dower r ights in such property by force of law. And if there was such a gift, w hy was Mary Adkins required to sign off. And again where is the proof o f such a gift? Then of course there is the fact that Mrs Buckland2's na me was "Eliza" rather than Elizabeth. But then this amounts to nothing m ore than speculation piled on speculation and not supported by the face o f the release. Good genealogy requires corroboration for a fact to be " proven". Mrs. Holman's honest admission she has no proof and offers only "her op inion" ends any possible acceptance of the doubtful surmise. Her 8 year s of "exhaustive" research, including considerable time spent on the an cestry of Samuel Hills, means Mrs. Holman found no corroboration for th e Jacobus position. She was assisted by both Mr. Jacobus, Leon Clark Hi lls and others. In addition to denying that John Hills of Saybrook was a son of William o f Hartford, Mrs Holman also believes that his name was Hill not Hills, d espite finding town records, Saybrook deeds and an ear tag in the name J ohn Hills. While it was fairly common for records to show an individual a s a Hill despite that person being a Hills, it was far rarer (in fact e xtraordinary) to find an early written record of Hills who was instead a H ill. Here we have multiple public records with this man's name as "Hill s". Jacobus was corrected on a similar issue by THE GREAT MIGRATION BEGINS. A nderson reverses Jacobus's claim that Thomas Hill of Roxbury was Willia m Hills' brother. Anderson finds that Thomas Hill was neither a Hills n or a brother to William. In fact, it is unlikely William Hills Sr's bro ther Thomas ever came to America. There are estate records in England s uggesting Thomas Hills died prior to 1623. It is likely we have a famil ar issue with John and Samuel Hills of Saybrook, excepting that public r ecords show the "s" with John Hills. Holman also contests whether the son Samuel born in 1671 was the same S amuel Hills, who subsequently shows in Duxbury and Lebanon, based on he r belief that he must have been born in 1673. Her work has many minor e rrors for names and dates, raising the issue of how much credence to gi ve her "opinion" on this issue. Her larger issue involves the Goshen parish records from February 1734- 35 of Samuel Hills. His birthday was in May according to the Saybrook V ital Records; and thus if the Goshen wedding was in February 1735, as a rgued by Mrs. Holman based on the recorded marriage contract, then Samu el, if age 62 on the date of the February 25th wedding, was probably bo rn no later than 1672 not 1673. Even if this were not the Samuel of Say brook, odds are statistically very high that his birthday would be late r than February of any given year. And as a point of fact, Holman did not consider the wedding contract, w hich contains the statement of ages of the bride and groom, predated th e marriage; and that the implementation of the wedding contract include d a prior land transfer dated 22 February 1734. Holman's error as to Sa muel's birth year is compounded, especially since the wedding appears t o have occurred in 1734 rather than 1735. She notes the wedding took pl ace 3 days after the 22 February 1734 land transaction with son Ephraim b y which Ephraim received 11 acres of land, various animals and in excha nge took on obligations to support his father Samuel and a new wife. Ep hraim's deed was recorded 29 March 1735 but the deed itself was a year o ld at that time. There was also an earlier 1733 land transaction involv ing the same land and obligations but between Samuel Hills Sr and Jr wh ere Jr returned acreage to his father. Again indicating Samuel Sr's pla ns to remarry were much earlier than claimed by Mrs. Holman. In any eve nt, Samuel Hills, if age 62 on 25 February 1734, would have been born i n 1671 as stated by the Saybrook Town records. Additionally in early America, a proper Puritan wedding of propertied p arties was normally proceded by a wedding contract, the posting of the b anns for a period of 3 weeks prior to the wedding and other requirement s satisfied before the wedding ceremony took place. The wedding process f rom betrothal to ceremony normally was a two or three month process. Ad ditional time was normal for the wedding contract negotiations. A wedding contract here probably dates to 1733 and would again support a b irthday in 1671. The numerous deeds recording a contract for the care o f Samuel and a new wife suggest that negotiations were drawn out and in volved some "dissatisfaction" as the deeds between Samuel and Samuel Jr r eveal. The ceremony itself was a civil not a church event. The fact that the w edding contract is recorded in the church records of a certain year is q uite unusual and not indicative of the actual date of marriage. Such a d ocument is similar to our prenuptial agreements of today and is enforce able by the courts, having no religious signifigance. It is instructive t hat Samuel by a deed dated 22 Feb 1734 made a conditional gift of land, f arm animals, tools, clothing and items to his son Ephraim where Ephraim w as then obligated to provide ...for comfortable support of life.. of Sa muel and a wife, if any. This deed provide for any disputes of the part ies to be submitted to two deacons of the church in Goshen for settleme nt. (Lebanon Deeds 5:129) The marriage contract seemingly provided a si milar dispute resolution. One of the striking things about Mrs. Holman's claim that Samuel was bo rn in 1673, as she herself admits, is it results in his 1694 marriage a t barely the age of majority- 21. But among both the early Pilgrims and P uritans, the age of the male at first marriage was typically closer to 2 7 than to 21. See A LITTLE COMMONWEALTH FAMILY LIFE IN PLYMOUTH COLONY J ohn Demos Oxford Press 2000 13th edition page 193. The demographic stud y of 650 individuals in Plymouth shows a mean age of men at first marri age for Samuel's cohort of 25.4 and for women of 20.2 years. For all me n in the sample, covering individuals born between 1600 and 1700, the m ean age at marriage was nearly 27. While such a study is not conclusive , it does raise a red flag for a marriage where the age of one of the p arties is far from the norm. You have to bear in mind the scarcity of f emales in early America which would put young poor men at a disadvantag e to more established older males. A marriage in 1670 of a male (John Hills) born about 1644 would fit Dem os's profile fairly accurately. Such a man of age 26 or 27 would not be a " callow youth" as John is called at times by Mr. Jacobus in his objectio ns to the marriage with the relic Jane Bushnell. However, Samuel's marr iage at barely age 21, as alleged by Mrs. Holman, clearly does not fit t he profile and is subject to the "callow" objection. Samuel's marriage a t over age 23 as stated by HFIA is closer to the expected cohort averag e of his time-25 than to Mrs. Holman's boy groom of age 21. In the absence of reasonable evidence to the contrary, and on the ultim ate fact that as HFIA puts it "There was no other John Hill(s) of age i n the Connecticut area to have married in 1670", there seems little rea son to doubt that John Hills who married Jane Bushnell in 1670 in Saybr ook was the son of William Hills of Hartford. An intensive and document ed search was made for any other John Hill(s) in the area by genealogis ts working for the compiler and editor of HFIA. Mrs. Holman herself rev isted the same territory over an 8 year period of research and found no o ther possiblity. The search for potential John Hill(s) in Connecticut s tarted with the original founding families of Hartford and was extended t o all of Connecticut which had a population of some few thousand people i n 1670. HFIA, while far from perfect, was based on extensive records an d research for early Hills and collaterals throughout New England gathe red over a 20 year period by NEGHS certified researchers and a large gr oup of assistants. Mr. Jacobus in his lifetime of gathering records found no other ancesto r nor did Mrs. Holman in her "exhaustive" research. It is clear that Mr J acobus took exception to some of the more flowery language of HFIA but t hat language style was a custom of the time rather than necessarily a f ailure of research effort. In contrast, we find more than a few expected records of John Hills, so n of William of Hartford, in the expected Hartford/Saybrook area, doing t he expected things of a Puritan man of the day - freeman status, buying a nd selling lands, farming and raising stock animals, military service, m arrying and having children, participating in a probate and then dying. W e do not find church records but then much of Saybrook was destroyed in K ing Philip's War and not all people participated in church matters. We know John was alive during the period of 1644 to 1692. We know, by s tatements of Savage and by probate records from Suffolk County along wi th Saybrook town records, that John was not in Hartford for much of tha t time. The absence of a home and home lot in his estate inventory is a gain indicative that John lived elsewhere. One wonders if John died fol lowing an illness, returning to Hartford to live out his final days wit h family members and near medical personnel. It may be that John married a second or a third time. Bachelorhood was n ot approved at the time. It is also perhaps equally possible that his w ife Jane was also known as Mary at some point by some people. But there i s no record of either possibility; and absent some kind of proof, the J acobus argument must fail as unproven. John would not have been the fir st nor the last Hills to marry a woman who was older than himself. We h ave to regard any claim to lineage to one of John's unnamed daughters a s "unproven" in the absence of some further record. Likewise, there is no reason to doubt the Samuel Hills born in 1671 as r ecorded in Saybrook town records was the same Samuel Hills who went on t o marry Phebe Leonard in Duxbury. There is no known record of any other p ossible Samuel Hills or of an immigrant Samuel Hills to Duxbury. The to wn records of Saybrook record the name as Hills. The 1734 Church record s of Goshen match to Samuel of Saybrook. His Lebanon deposition of Marc h 27, 1747 with its sworn statement of his age of 76 and prior residenc e, and having no genealogical purpose at the time made, point to the 16 71 date recorded in Saybrook and corroborate the age listed in his seco nd marriage contract. It seems to me the burden of proof rests squarely on anyone who wants t o contest the town records of Hartford and Saybrook, the court records o f Massachuetts, the public records of Duxbury, Plymouth Colony, the lan d records of New London and the church records from Hartford and Goshen p arishes. In other words we have primary records with additional corrobo ration. To refute those records, I suggest a researcher has a very high burden o f proof and would need to produce an alternative ancestor, alternate pr imary records or an immigration record or a reasonable explanation for r ejecting the records that do exist. No other ancestor for Samuel Hills h as been found in some 125 years of research. While the various records d o not verify each and every day of the life of John and Jane nor do the y answer each and every question that we might have, they are "almost c onclusive". The records are far more extensive than those for many indi viduals for whom there has been no challenge of their connection to the H ills of Hartford. Perhaps DNA testing can put this issue to bed once an d for all. The probable age disparity between John Hills and Jane, the relic Bushn ell, is troubling to some degree. While we do not have any proof of the e xtent of the age disparity, we do have to keep in mind that in early co lonial times there was considerable social pressure for men and women t o be married, despite conditions we might consider incompatible. Coloni al marriages have been often characterized as "Economic Unions" rather t han "Love Matches". A modern sensibility to an age variance would seem r ather strange to our ancestors for whom a well to do widow was often a m ore attractive potential mate than a young maid still under the control o f her parents. The Board for Certification of Genealogists has a current "Genealogical P roof Standard" which is held to be a fundamental concept. "In order to m erit confidence, each conclusion about an ancestor must have sufficient c redibility to be accepted as 'proved'. Acceptable conclusions, therefor e must meet the Genealogical Proof Standard (GPS). The GPS consists of f ive elements: . a reasonably exhaustive search . complete and accurate source citations . analysis and correlation of collected information . resolution of any conflicting evidence; and . a soundly reasoned coherently written conclusion" I would submit that neither Mr. Jacobus nor Mrs. Holman met this standa rd of proof in their work related to John Hills, his wife and children. N either can lay claim to a single primary record for their arguments or t o have resolved conflicting evidence. Mrs. Holman frankly admits to having no proof. Some of her arguments ar e at variance with her own records- the marriage year of Samuel. Others a re at variance with Samuel Hills' own sworn testimony- his birth year a nd age. Others are at variance with known public records- his name Hill s. Others are inconsistent with normal practices of the time - 21 year o ld men were not bridegrooms in Plymouth Colony. Mr. Jacobus raises dubious arguments as to Jane the relic Bushnell's in appropriate age and heiress status, the unknown ownership of a property s old in 1698-99 to a propertied relative and John's failure to list a so n in an oral will. Such arguments are inconsistent with the terms of th e 1692 Hills will, practices of the times, various public records, and h ave no corroboration in any known record. Such unproven arguments must f all in the face of inconsistency with actual records and practices of t he time. He hedges with his "appears likely" but that is not genealogic al proof. Even worse, his case resting only on "appears likely" is then s tated to be absolute fact in his latter writings, clearly violating the g enealogical proof standard.
