Tracing a Name With Various Spellings

Question: I have some records pertaining to my ancestor, Jacob Heaney, born circa 1712, who died in Bucks County, Pa., in 1801. He married a Catherine Weisbacher about 1749.

My family history says he came from Ireland, but a “History of Bucks County, Penn.,” indicates he changed his name from Honig or Hoenig. This appears to be of German origin to me. How can I verify if such a name change took place?

Answer: County history books are not at the top of sources for genealogical evidence. However, they must be used as clues to our families’ origins.

Unless your ancestor actually went to court and had a name change and you can locate this record, you will have to trace the line in all its variant spellings until you can determine whether this line has German or Irish roots.

Heaney, O’Heaney or Heeney is an Irish surname found in several locales there. Hoenig/Hoening is a German place surname.

Because of the marriage to a Weisbacher and the fact they lived in Bucks County, I suspect the family is of German origin.

Most likely there was a Scotch-Irish county clerk involved, and such an official would have written the name as Heaney rather than Hoenig.

The best source in this case is church records. Most German families in this place and time belonged to a Reformed Church, usually Lutheran (and they may be intermixed with Dutch Reformed). Most Irish--what we know as Scotch-Irish--were Presbyterian. Both ethnic groups were in this area at this date. However, your families could have been Quakers to further complicate matters.

Fortunately many of these early church records of Bucks County have been microfilmed and are available through the LDS (Mormon) Family History Libraries.

Methodically trace your Heaney ancestors through deed records. See how they spelled their names on documents they signed. It is the best evidence you’ll find. An Ulster Scot (Scotch-Irish) would not have signed his name Hoening if it was Heaney.

There are connections among some of the German Palatine families of New York that came in 1710 with lines that went first to Ireland before coming to America. So your family’s story about coming from Ireland may be technically true, though the ancestral home was in what we know as Germany today. We often are unaware that our families did not come directly to America from their country of origin.