Hiatt/Hiett Apparently should be Penn Project but can we prove arrival?

Question

Father and son John Hiett (senior) and John Hiatt (junior) have profiles which currently lack much in the way of primary source documentation.

Senior is first documented in Bucks County, Pennsylvania 14 of 8th 1700 by a land transaction. A collection of numerous independent 'family traditions' published 1951 (well-researched) hold that Hiatt came from England with Penn. But, records of the family before the 1700 land transaction are so far elusive.

Gilbert Cope extensively researched Quaker records in search of this family. A summary of what he searched can be found here. Quaker records for this time and place are certainly not complete or perhaps Hiatt was disowned at some point.

Speculation is made that the family originates Somerset but this appears to be based solely upon an entry in Besse's "Sufferings" [I:634] of a John Hyott who cannot so far be further traced (this is noted in the Research Notes of John Hiatt junior's profile).

Of the research on the immigrant Hiatt/Hiett available online currently, that of William Johnson can be found here. A later publication linked on the profile of Hiatt junior appears to have been withdrawn from the Family Search and FHC libraries (or at least I cannot find it, only found available print edition only via Google Books).

Comments

The site Butleigh.org has a fair amount of documentation on Hiatt/Hiett and notations as to that which remains conjecture (thanks to a vicar who recorded nothing for a period of 37 years). The father/son relationship is documented by christening record in Street, Somerset. There is no record of them being Quaker, certainly not these generations on the England side of things. They were perhaps not Quaker in the colony though living among them. Thus Gilbert Cope found no Quaker records.

It remains to be seen if the Hyott in Besse is one of the Hietts of Street or Butleigh in Somerset.

Documents both in England and the colony place the arrival of the family in the colony in first half 1699.

Answer 1

The butleigh.org site proves that the John Hiett who married Mary Smith is the immigrant who came to PA in 1699.  He did attend Quaker meetings there but I doubt that he was the same John Hiett in Besse.  Also my opinion is that he wasn't as active in the church as was his wife and her family.  She and her children are mentioned in Quaker records in PA in 1706 though he is not.  I also wonder why it took 6 years for her to show up in the records after they arrived.

Comments

You are referring to the 13 Apr 1700 indenture? It is cited on the profile.

Answer 2

A combination of various documents and the 1700 indenture show his arrival is 1699 and so he has been added to Penn Project with Penn Project added as a profile manager.