This study owes its beginnings to the oral traditions and stories passed down by my father Derek Ernest HINXMAN (1924-1981), which made me want to learn more about our family’s intriguing past. 

In 1970 my limited early knowledge about our family tree led me to start collecting information on anyone bearing the HINXMAN surname, and it soon became clear that our name is very rare.  This suggested we might be just one family, so in 1984 I began a One Name Study to test that possibility.

Phoning and writing to every HINXMAN contact I could discover in the UK, and later worldwide, I asked for details of their ancestors and started to collate these into family branches, naming each one after their earliest known location.  Extending these with documentary research, and increasingly working online, I began to link the branches together.  Utilizing a wide range of sources to trace them further back in time, I discovered many fascinating personal stories and unsuspected connections.

Notes: 

To aid clarity, surnames throughout this study are shown in UPPER CASE, and all variants of the Henxman occupational title are in Title Case.

I’m now seeking one or more successors as HINXMAN family historians, who can continue to preserve this increasingly digital archive and enjoy enhancing and communicating it to further generations of HINXMAN descendants across the world.  Do get in touch, if you’re interested in taking on this rewarding hobby.

More than 50 years of research and correspondence has resulted in a good understanding of our family’s origins and history, underpinned by extensive data.  These now include:

• Detailed family trees of all HINXMAN branches worldwide (additional names, events & dates always welcome).
• A unique collection of HINXMAN family history pictures, maps, books, documents and memorabilia.
• Many stories researched about the lives and endeavours of individual HINXMANs.
• Growing knowledge of how the family branches are connected, and the time and place of our family's origin.
• The probable circumstances surrounding our surname origin, founding father, and family origin.
• Comparison of HINXMAN and other relevant grants of arms, and what they imply.
• Expert knowledge on our namesakes the Henxmen, inner bodyguards to the English royal family for more than two centuries.
• A compilation of every known contemporary mention of the mediaeval & Renaissance Henxmen: a unique historical record.
• Discovery of our identity before we became HINXMANs - and even earlier, reaching back to the early 14^th century.