The Hissem-Montague Family
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The Hissem-Montague Family
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Welcome to the home page of my web site. Below is my literal home, beautiful San Diego, California.
While it may eventually become many things, this site is currently dedicated to the genealogy of the Hissem family, but includes references to all the families of Haysham, Heysham, Hysham, Heesham, Haysom, Hysom, Hesam, Hesom, Hessam, Hissam, Hissem, Hissim and Hissom of England, India, the West Indies, Canada, Australia and America, as well as those of Grenet, Gernet, Garnet, Garnett, Montague, Wells, Six, Sixt, Offerman, and Dengler.
As you will read, I believe I can accurately trace my Hissem family back over three hundred years to our first American forebear, John Heesom. He had emigrated from England and was living in the Quaker colony of Burlington, in the Delaware river valley of West Jersey, in 1687. I can't be certain who his father was, though you'll see inside that I'm not afraid to guess, but I am fairly confident that I have found our roots to the northwest of England, in Lancashire county. Members of the Heesom/Heysham family have lived in and around the city of Lancaster, and the eponymous village of Heysham a few miles to the west, since the 12th century. This family has traditionally held that they descended from a junior branch of the Franco-Norman Gernet family who held estates in the north of England as the King's Forester in the first centuries after the Conquest. Amongst these estates was the the manor of Heysham. This family came to England in the 11th century. I have tracked them, under the surname Grenet or Guerinet, to the village of Fécamp, in Normandy, and the cathedral city of Chartres, in the old County of Blois. If the latter is true, I've been able to trace a 1000 year history for the family.
I've enjoyed writing this history, I hope you enjoy reading it.
To navigate this site you may go through all the pages sequentially by using the arrow keys at the bottom of each page. This is the story of the family, in order, from the earliest point and is how this story is meant to be read. Alternatively, individual pages may be selected using the menu at the top of the page. Most of the pages are identified by the earliest member of that branch of the family. One other means of navigation is to go to the surname page and select an individual. Clicking on their name will take you to the page on which their biography is located. I am not assiduous enough to promise you that all the surnames I have discovered are listed there, but there are a great bunch.
