My

Newton County Mississippi Connection

The HITT family

Descendants of Jacob HEITE of German

The Newton County Mississippi Connection starts in the sixth generation

With

Benjamin HITT born 1777/79 in Virginia married Nancy CURNAL

Benjamin was given the right to pray and preach the Word of God May 9, 1818. On November 11, 1826 Benjamin and Nancy received their letters of dismissal from the Bethabara Church so that they could travel to Greene County, Alabama and later moved to Newton County, Mississippi

The Heite family lived in the Catholic part of Siegen, and was subject to the Catholic Counts of Nassau. As Protestants, they sought religious freedom, which perhaps, the reason young Peter and Elizabeth became emigrants to the United States. Peter had become associated with the Christian faith known as the Baptist Brethren. While the German families were working in the mines and trying to establish their religious freedom, Governor Alexander Spotswood of Virginia was trying to establish an iron works in the new country. Before his iron works could be established, however, he needed trained workers. Governor Spotswood enlisted the aid of Baron De Graffenreid to help recruit people to come to the United States. He offered work in the mines and an allotment of land to each of the emigrants who would leave his beloved homeland and journey to the new country to live. Although there were three groups of immigrants who came to Virginia during the administration of Governor Spotswood, Peter and Elizabeth Hitt were among the first group consisting of 42 persons. It has been definitely established that the Hitts and their party came from Germany to England, supposedly on a German ship. They remained in England during the fall of 1713 and January of 1714, waiting for a ship to America and their new life with freedom to worship according to the dictates of their own consciences. The families landed in the state of Virginia in April 1714, at the wharf of Governor Spotswood, located on the Potomac River near Belvoir. At a Council meeting, on April 28, 1714, Governor Spotswood reported that a sundry number of German families had arrived in the area and should be given the status of Rangers in respect to exemption of parish lives.

If anyone have information that can update this family please write or email Frank Harrison as listed below. I am interested in all family information, but is in most need of the Newton County Connection.

Most of the HITT family information came from a book titled

BENJAMIN HITT and NANCY CURNAL their Antecedents and Descendants