Janice E. Martin's Page

My genealogist Houghtaling cousin told me a story once ... it's hard to believe it's true, but it's fun to tell ... about how there are two distinct Houghtaling families. Mathys got kicked out of the almshouse in Amsterdam and when he got to New Netherland, he didn't much like the British, especially when they were bossing him around to take a last name. He'd get drunk, yell something nasty about the British crown and end up in jail and before a judge. One night, he ended up in the drunk tank with the judge who had been sending him to jail all these times. The judge's name was Houghtaling, and that's how Mathys found his surname.

She claimed she saw the court records that supported the story, but in the back of my mind, I figured she was just having me on. But that hasn't stopped me from telling it over and over!

So when I meet a new Houghtaling, I ask which drunk they're related to.

I'm Mathys, Jacob, Johannes, Isaac, John Isaac, David Wager, Charles Skillen, Harold ... One of my Houghtaling cousins did a lot of research. I'll dig out what I have to see if there's anything on little Mathys's line.