Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Family History Writing Challenge Day 14

At this point I have exhausted every avenue that I can think of, and that has been suggested to me, in attempting to find out who were the parents of Thompson Hightower. I will continue to watch for DNA matches that might point me to another person researching this family, as well as check online resources as information in constantly added.

But I feel that my next step is to hire a genealogist who specializes in Kenton County/Campbell County genealogy to see if he or she knows of resources that I have missed. Thanks to the postings this month on my blog, I can point the genealogist here so that my efforts won’t be duplicated.

Elizabeth Hightower
Thus I will be ending my writings on the Family History Writing Challenge for this year, and will instead resume my 52 Ancestors posts. But I’ll leave you with this intriguing piece that I found at the Kenton County Public Library. An article dated 22 July 1870 on page 1 of the Cincinnati Daily Gazette discussed the case of the Commonwealth vs. Richard Harris in which Harris had been accused of raping Mrs. Elizabeth Hightower. Thompson Hightower died in 1866. Is this his widow, Elizabeth? There was another Hightower named Rolla living in Kenton County at the same time, and his wife was also named Elizabeth, so it could have been her as well.

It is a noteworthy case in that the acting mayor allowed the “introduction of a negro woman as testimony for the prosecution.” It is believed to be the first instance of the court in Covington allowing a negro to testify in a case that involved a white person. The testimony resulted in the accused going free. It would be interesting to see if any other articles exist on this case.

For now, I am stepping away from the Hightower brick wall I have been banging my head against.

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