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I have been researching my family history since 1999. In so doing, I've accumulated information and details about all occurences of the HATTAM name, and this site contains just some of the data I have gathered so far.
My HATTAM family comes from St Just in Penwith in West Cornwall at least as far back as the 1779 marriage of John Hattam and Elizabeth Eddy. There is also a HATTAM family from Kenwyn (Truro), Cornwall which I've traced back to the 1797 marriage of John Hattam and Rebecca Mitchell. It is highly likely that these families are connected, and I have a tentative "early HATTAM" tree in Cornwall which apparently brings together all the available information.
There are other HATTAM families from Shropshire, Bedfordshire and London. Whether or not these are related to each other or to the Cornish ones is unknown at the moment, but I do have family trees for each of them - mostly back to the early 1800's.
Many of the Cornish HATTAM's emigrated in the mid-late nineteenth century, most went to Australia, some to South Africa and the USA. Nearly all of the emigration was to hard rock mining areas, where the Cornish expertise in mining tin and copper ore was in demand. Most HATTAM's currently in Durham and neighbouring counties are descendants of Cornish (Truro) Hattam's who went there to mine coal in the 1860's.
There are also some HATTAM's who emigrated to the USA around 1900 from what was then Persia. This might be a clue as to the origin of the name too, as HATTAM is not a typical Cornish name, and Cornwall used to be the major source of tin for the known world.
In general I have found it easier to work out all the various HATTAM family trees using information as I've come by it, rather than ignore or set aside information then wonder where it is when I find that I did need it after all.
Software & Web Output
I construct the family trees using GEDitCOM - a genealogy package available for the Mac. This uses GEDCOM as its native file format, avoiding proprietry formats and ensures complete adherence to the GEDCOM 5.5 standard. I can then quickly update the website with a new GEDCOM file which is rendered into webpages using phpGedView. This avoids generating hundreds of static webpages, and the headache in managing them.
Here are the two Cornish HATTAM family trees, with the "early HATTAM" tree now merged into the St Just one.
Discussion Forum
I've also started a discussion forum (bulletin board) for people to post articles and questions. I've tried to think of various topics, but you can always suggest some more.
To register you do need to know the year in which "Civil Registration" for births, marriages and deaths began in England & Wales. This year is the VIP code.
Pictures
I'm also taking pictures of places in and around St Just - some examples are in the Gallery. There's a variety of scenic views and other topics. I'd also be very happy to receive pictures of people on the family trees, as it brightens up the data immensely.
Terms of Use and Copyright
Use of this site is governed by the Terms of use, and please also note the assertion of Copyright.
Contact Me
I'll be very pleased to hear from you if you find any errors or can provide additional information.
You can by clicking here.
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