At some point I mentioned that Gilbert Hiltman, the protagonist of my novel The Witch Watch – was named after my great-grandfather. I’ve always been fascinated by grandpa Gilbert. I’ve recently obtained some photos of himMom got some photos and she’s been posting them on Facebook. so I thought I’d share. I never even knew these existed until now.
It turns out I’ve got some English ancestry in my family tree. The running joke in the USAActually, I think the joke is over now, but when I was a kid people still obsessed over this. is that everyone claims to be English colonists that overthrew the British but we’re actually mostly Europeans that immigrated at the turn of the twentieth century. I assumed this was true of me as well. Not that I care one way or the other. I was just betting on the averages. I assumed “Heginbotham” was some horrible Anglican butchery of a German name. I figured some Hanz Hegunchbachataluntz arrived on Ellis Island and “Higenbotham” was the best the immigration officer could manage.
But no. William Heginbotham immigrated from Jolly old England in the early 1800’s. I don’t know why he left home, why he came here, or what he did to earn a living.
(You’ll notice the name spelled “Higenbotham” and “Heginbotham” here. I can find examples of both spellings in my notes and I don’t know if it’s a typo or an official change somewhere along the line. For the record, “Higenbotham” is how it’s spelled in newsclippings and “Heginbotham” is how everyone pronounces it. This is less confusing than other immigrant names, which would often fragment a single name into multiple spellings. The same family of immigrants might end up named Baer, Burr, and Barr, depending on numerous factors such as handwriting, immigration, mail delivery, and feuds.)
Eventually William had a son, who he named after himself…
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Gilbert”
Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.
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