The Saxon Chronicle is a manuscript which was painstakingly researched by monks of the 10th century and now dwells in the British Museum. Emerging through the Chronicles of history is one of the oldest family names, Heath and the distinguished history of this surname is interwoven into the history of England.

Historical analysts have used many sources in the preparation of your history such as the Domesday Book, the Ragman Rolls (1291-1296), the Curia Regis Rolls, the Pipe Rolls, the Hearth Rolls, parish registers, baptismals, tax records and other ancient documents and found the first record of the name Heath in Durham, where they were seated from very ancient times; some say well before the Norman Conguest and the arrival of Duke William at Hastings in 1066 A.D.

Your name, Heath, was found in the archives. The name was sometimes revealed as Heath, Hethe, and these changes in spelling occurred even between father and son. It was not uncommon, for example, for a person to be born with one spelling variation, married with another, and for yet another to appear on his gravestone. Scribes spelt the name the way it sounded as it was told to them. From century spellings changed.

The family name Heath was found to be descended from the Saxon race. The Saxons were fair skinned people led by the brothersGeneral/Commanders Hengist and Horsa, who settled in England from about the year 400 A.D. They settled firstly on the southeast coast, coming from the Rhine Valley. They spread north and westward from Kent and during the next four hundred years forced the Ancient Britons back into Wales and Cornwall to the west, Cumbria and Scotland to the north. The Angles held the eastern coastline, the south folk in Suffolk, the north folk in Norfolk. Under Anglo/Saxon five century rule the nation divided into five separate kingdoms, a high king being elected as supreme ruler. Alfred the Great emerged in the 9th century as the Saxon leader to dispel the Danish invasion.

England, by 1066, was ably led by Harold, King of the Saxons and was enjoying reasonable peace and prosperity. The Norman invasion from France under Duke William of Normandy, and their victory at the Battle of Hastings, found Saxon land owners to be forfeited their land. William, with an army of 40,000, drove north, wasting the northern counties. Both religious Norman nobles and Saxons fled over the border into Scotland. Those Saxons who remained were restive under Norman rule, and many moved northward to the midlands, Lancashire and Yorkshire where Norman influence prevailed less.

The family name Heath emerged as a notable English family name in the county of Durham where they were recorded as a family of great antiquity seated at Little Eden with manor and estates in that shire. They later branched to Twickenham and Mile End in Middlesex, to Oxfordshire, Kent, and Fordhall in Warwickshire. By the 14th century they had acquired large estates in Tanridge in Surrey which was headed by Sir Robert Heath, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas. Nicholas Heath was Bishop of Rochester, Bishop of Worcester, and finally Archbishop of York. Notable amongst the family at this time was Archbishop of York.

The next two or three centuries found the surname Heath flourshing and contributing greatly in the culture of the nation. During the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries England was ravaged by religious conflict. Protestantism, the newly found political fervor of Cromwellianism, and the remmants of the Roman Church rejected all but the most ardent followers. As each group gained power during these turbulent times many were burnt at the stake but many more were banished from the land, losing their titles, estates and status. Many families were freely “encourged” to migrate to Ireland, or to the “colonies”. Some were rewarded with grants of lands; other were indentured as servants for as long as ten years.

In Ireland they became known as the “Adventures for land in Ireland”. They were government sponsored Protestant settlers who “undertook” to keep their faith, being granted lands previously owned by the Catholic Irish for only nominal payment. They were also known as the “Undertakers”. In Ireland they settled in Dublin.

These unsettling times were disturbing and the New World beckoned the adventurous. They migrated, some voluntarily from Ireland, some by Army service, but mostly directly from England, their home territories. Some also moved to the European continent. Members of the family name Heath sailed aboard the armada of small sailing ships known as the “White Sails” which plied the stormy Atlantic. These overcrowded ships were pestilence ridden, sometimes 30% to 40% of the passenger list never reaching their destination, their numbers decimated by sickness and the elements. Many were buried at sea.

Included amongst the first migrants who settled in North America which could be considered a kinsman of the surname Heath, or a variable spelling of that family name was William Heath, who settled in New England in 1620, later moving to Boston in 1632; Amory, Henry, Isaac, Jane, John, Margaret, Mary, Nicholas, Thomas and William Heath, all settled in Virginia between 1640 and 1680. Many also settled in Boston, Maryland and Philadelphia.

The east coast ports were crowded. From the port of entry many settlers trekked their way west, joining the wagon trains to the prairies or to the west coast. During the American War of Independence, many loyalists made their way north to Canada about 1790, and became known as the United Empire of Loyalists. They were granted equivalent lands along the banks of the St. Lawrence River and in the Niagara Peninsula. Contemporary notables of this surname, Heath, include many distinguished contributors-Edward Heath, Ex Prime Minister of England; Air Marshall Sir Maurice Heath; John Heath, Professor of Economics; John Heath, Diplomat.

During the course of our research we also determined the many Coat of Arms granted to different branches of the family name.

The most ancient grant of a Coat of Arms found was:

Gold with two black stars and a gold heathcock.

The Crest is: A gold rooster head.