USA > New York > New York City > Contributions to the history of ancient families of New Amsterdam and New York > Part 13
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In the Journal of a Voyage to New York, &c., in 1679-80, by Jaspar Dankers and Peter Sluyter, translated by Henry C. Murphy, Esq., and published in the Memoirs of the Long Island Historical Society, vol. i., will be found many interesting particulars relating to Augustyn Hermans and his family. Dankers and Sluyter belonged to the community of Laba- dists-a religious sect founded by Jean de Labadie, born near Bordeaux, in 1610-who, having made an unsuccessful attempt to colonize at Suri-
* Cal. N. Y. Hist. MSS. Dutch, pp. 28, 30-5-6-7, 43-7, 92, 127-8, 131-2, 204, 331. O'Callaghan's Regis- ter of New Netherland, pp. 56-57. 137-8.
t Doc. Rel. to Col. Hist. of N. Y. vol. ii. p. 88. Brodhead's History of New York, vol. i. pp. 666-9, 673. O'Callaghan's Hist. of New Netherland, vol. ii. pp. 381-388. Memoirs of the Long Island Hist. Society, pp. Xxx1, 230.
# HERMAN, or HARMAN, as the name was afterwards changed to, was the first proprietor of the celebrated Bohemia Manor, consisting of eighteen thousand acres of land, which lays partly in St. George's and Pen- cader hundreds, in Newcastle county, and partly in Cecil county, Maryland. This land is supposed to be the best in Delaware. (Extract from Vincent's History of Delaware, vol. i. p. 319.)
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nam, came to New York and the adjoining colonies, as detailed in their journal, on a tour of observation, having for its ultimate object the estab- lishment here of a colony of their co-religionists. Ephraim Hermans, the oldest son of Augustyn Hermans, became tinctured with their doctrines, and persuaded his father into an agreement to convey a portion of his manor to Dankers, Sluyter, and others, with the view of drawing a large community near his domain, and thus enhancing its value. Afterwards, believing that some deceit had been practised upon him in the matter, he refused to make the conveyance, but was finally compelled to do so by the court. On the 11th of August, 1684, he conveyed 3,750 acres of his manor lands "to Peter Sluyter, alias Vorsman, Jasper Danckaerts, alias Schilders, of Friesland ; Petrus Bayard, of New York ; and John Moll and Arnoldus de la Grange, of Delaware, in company." Upon this tract, the Labadists settled, but " nothing of them remained as a religious commu- nity " five years after the death of Peter Sluyter, which occurred in 1722.
When the Labadist travellers first visited Augustyn Hermans at his Manor, Dec. 3, 1679, they brought a letter from his son Ephraim, and were treated with "every kindness," although he was sick "and very miserable, both in body and soul ;" he had none but negroes to serve him, and his misery was increased " by a miserable, doubly miserable wife," so miserable that they " will not relate it here." In the entry of their jour- nal, Dec. 26, 1679, they speak of the family as follows :- " Ephraim Her- mans is the oldest child of Augustine Hermans, there being two brothers and three sisters, one of whom lives now at Amsterdam. They are all of a Dutch mother, after whose death their father married an English woman, who is the most artful and despicable creature that can be found. He is a very godless person, and his wife, by her wickedness, has compelled all these children to leave their father's house and live elsewhere." Full of self-righteousness, these men regarded every one outside of their own per- suasion as special objects of God's wrath, and doomed to endless perdi- tion. A part at least of this tirade was doubtless due to the fact that Her- mans had as poor an opinion of their religious tenets as they had of his godliness, and, in his will, " speaks in emphatic terms of condemnation of the connection of his son Ephraim with the Labadists."
JANNETJE VARLETH, his first wife, died some time after their removal to Bohemia manor, and probably prior to 1666. In that year, " Augustine Harman, of Prague, in the kingdom of Bohemia, petitioned the Maryland Assembly for the naturalization of himself, his sons Ephraim Georgius, Casparus, and his daughters Anna Margaritta, Judith, and Francina." * The custom then obtained of naturalizing the wife, as well as the other members of a family, and as her name is not mentioned in this petition, there is little doubt she was not living at that date. His second wife was a MISS WARD, of Cecil County, Maryland, t by whom he probably had no issue ; the statement made by Mr. Hanson that his daughter, Anna Mar- garet, was the fruit of this second marriage, is shown to be an error by the Labadists' account of the family, and the baptismal records of the Dutch Church in New York.
AUGUSTYN HERMANS died in 1686,į and had issue by his wife JANNETJE
* O'Neil's Terra Maria, p. 164, foot note.
+ Hanson's Old Kent, Maryland, p. 80.
# Memoirs of the Long Island Hist. Society, vol. i. p. xxxiv. foot note. The date of his death, as here given by Mr. Murphy, is undoubtedly correct. In Vincent's History of Delaware, vol. i. p. 468, the state- ment is made that " his death must have occurred about the last of December, 1669, as on the 14th of De-
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VARLETH, two sons and three daughters, baptized in the Dutch Church in New Amsterdam, viz. :
I. EPHRAIM GEORGIUS HERMANS, bap. Sept. 1, 1652. His second name, Georgius, is usually dropped in the records. He accompanied his father's family on their removal to Maryland, but, in 1673, was a resident of New York city. He was a man of note, and held several offices under the English government in New York and Delaware, to which latter place he removed about 1676, and settled at Newcastle. He subsequently became a Labadist, and his father, it is said, pronounced a curse upon him " that he might not live two years " after joining that sect. He married in New York, September 3, 1679, Elizabeth · Rodenburg, who appears to have been a favorite with the Labadists. They speak of her as having " the quietest disposition we have observed in America," and as being " politely educated." For a further account of them and their children, see page 32, foot note.
2. CASPARUS HERMANS, bap. Jan. 2, 1656. On the 16th Feb., 1674, he and his brother, Ephraim, obtained a patent for a tract of land near New- castle on the Delaware. In 1679, he was residing about twenty-two miles from his father's manor, on a place named Augustine, which the Labadists found well situated, and of which they remark, it " would not badly suit us." He was a member of the Pennsylvania General Assembly from New- castle, in 1683, 1684, and 1685. There was a Casper Augustine Herman, perhaps the same with his name slightly " dutchified," a member of the Legislature of Maryland, from Cecil county in 1694 .* His first wife was SUSANNA HUYBERTS, whom he probably married on the Delaware. He married second, in New York, August 23, 1682, ANNA REYNIERS. He had one son (and perhaps other children), named Ephraim Augustine Her- man, who was a member of the Legislature of Maryland, from Cecil county, in 1715, 1716, 1728, and 1731.
3. ANNA MARGARETA HERMANS, bap. March 10, 1658. She was keep- ing house for her brother Ephraim, at Newcastle, when the latter was visited by the Labadists in December, 1679. They speak of her as "a little volatile, but of a sweet and good disposition." She complained to them " that she was like a wild and desolate vine, trained up in a wild and desolate country ;" that she wanted to know more of God and to serve him, and hoped the Lord would be merciful to her. She treated them " with great affection, and received thankfully" what they said to her. She became the wife of MATTHIAS VANDERHEYDEN or VANDERLEYDEN, who was a member of the Maryland Legislature, from Cecil county, in 1709, 1713, 1715, and 1716. They had Issue :+
I. JANE VANDERHEYDEN, m. MR. COUTS, of Scotland.
2. ANNA FRANCINA VANDERHEYDEN, m. EDWARD SHIPPEN, son of Edward Shippen and Elizabeth Lybrand. He was born at Boston, Dec. 10, 1677-8, and died at Philadelphia, Dec.
cember," after the Labadists left him, " they were informed that he was very sick and at the point of death." An account is then given of his " tombstone," which was taken by the Bayards (who, after his death, came into possession of that portion of the manor in which his grave was situated), for a door for their family vault. The inscription on it is as follows :- " AUGUSTINE HERMAN, Bohemian, the first founder and seater of Bohemian Manor, Anno 1669."
The Labadists visited him in December, 1679, and the error in the date on the tombstone (?) described by Mr. Vincent is so palpable, that it hardly seems necessary to point it out. May it not have been a stone inscribed with the actual date of the settlement of the Manor ?
* Proud's Hist. of Pennsylvania, vol. i. pp. 236, 286, 292. Hanson's Old Kent, p. 380.
+ Hanson's Old Kent. Letters and Papers Relating, &c., to Provincial History of Penn. Privately Printed, 1856. (Shippen Genealogy.) Gibson's Biog. Sketches of Bordley family.
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26, 1714. They had one dau. Margaret, who m. John Jekyll, Esq., then collector of the Port of Boston. After Mr. Jekyll's death, she lived in Philadelphia, and died there about 1750. Their dau. Fanny Jekyll m. July 19, 1758, William, son of Edward Hicks, Esq. Another dau. Mar- garet Jekyll, m. Mr. Chalmers.
After the death of Edward Shippen, his widow,
ANNA FRANCINA, In. Col. Hynson of Chestertown, Md., where she died before 1768, aged ninety years.
3. AUGUSTINA VANDERHEYDEN, born in 1685, m. JAMES HARRIS, of Kent county, Maryland, and had son Matthias Harris. She died in 1775, aged 90 years.
4. ARIANA VANDERHEYDEN m. Feb. 9, 1713, JAMES FRISBY, son of James and Sarah Frisby, of Cecil county, Maryland, and had Sarah Frisby, born Dec. 7, 1714; Ariana Margaret Frisby, born Sept. 18, 1717, and Francina Augustina, born Aug. 16, 1719. JAMES FRISBY, died Dec. 18, 1719, aged 35 years, and his widow, ARIANA VANDERHEYDEN, married Sept. 1, 1723, THOMAS BORDLEY, born 1682 in Yorkshire, England ; he came to Kent Co., Md., in 1694, and finally settled at Annapolis ; they had Issue : three sons, Thomas, Matthias, and John Beale Bordley. Thomas Bordley died Oct. [1, 1726, O. S., and his widow ARIANA married for her third husband, in Nov., 1728, EDMUND JENINGS, EsQ., of Annapolis, where they resided until 1737, when they went to England. She was inoculated for small-pox there, of which she died in April, 1741. He died in 1756, while on a visit to England. They had Issue : one son, Edmund Jenings, born in 1731, and one dau. Ariana Jenings.
4. JUDITH HERMANS, bap. May 9, 1660. Her name appears in the petition of her father to the Maryland Assembly, in 1666, for the naturali- zation of himself and children, and is the last notice found of her.
5. FRANCINA HERMANS, bap. March 12, 1662. She went from Mary- land to Holland before 1679, but soon returned to this country. She joined the Dutch Church, in New York, by letter, or certificate, from the church in Old Amsterdam, Dec. 5, 1684, and was then single. She sub- sequently married JOSEPH WOODT (WOOD), and had bap. in the Dutch Church, in New York, Jenneken Wood, bap. Oct. 18, 1693.
4 iii. MARIA VARLETH2 was probably the second daughter of Casper Varleth' and his wife Judith. She was thrice married : Ist to JOHANNES VAN BEECK, 2d to PAULUS SCHRICK, and 3d to WILLIAM TELLER, whose widow she was at her death, in 1702. Her first marriage, in the spring of 1654, was the source of much trouble to the authorities of New Amsterdam. On the 10th of Feb., 1654, Johannes Van Beeck petitioned the Court of Burgomasters and Schepens that the banns of matrimony between him and Maria Varleth might be registered and proclaimed. This had previously been done through the court at Gravesend (L. I.), a proceeding which the New Am- sterdam court objected to as contrary to the "practice and custom of our Fatherland," because the parties were not domiciled there. Upon the earnest prayer and remonstrance of Casper Varleth and Johannes Van Beeck, the Court, on the 19th of Feb., 1654, enquired more fully into the matter, and, in an elaborate opinion, preserved in their minutes, finally ad-
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judged "that the aforesaid young persons having made their proper Ecclesi- astical proclamation with the earliest opportunity, that they follow it up with the bonds of matrimony immediately thereafter." * On the 2d of March following, Governor Stuyvesant requested a copy of this opinion or resolu- tion of the Board of Burgomasters and Schepens, with " the written rea- sons why such resolution was not submitted to the Director-General and Councillors for their approbation," and alleging that Johannes Van Buck- ly's [Van Beeck's] marriage was "not only without the knowledge of his Father but expressly against his prohibition against marrying abroad."+ In the meantime Van Beeck had resolved to consummate his matrimonial purpose elsewhere, and, on the 27th Feb., 1654, posted notices in various places in New Amsterdam, setting forth the difficulties opposed by Direc- tor Stuyvesant to his marriage at Gravesend, and protesting against the same, also giving his reasons for leaving the neighborhood. On the same day an order for his arrest was made, and a letter of the Director and Council was addressed to all Governors, Deputy Governors, Magistrates, and Christian Neighbors, stating that he and Maria Varleth, assisted by Caspar Varleth and Augustine Hermans, had run off to New England to get married, and requesting them not to solemnize such marriage, but send back the runaways. It appears, however, that they were married at Green- wich by Richard Crabb, a noted character and Acting Magistrate of that place. On the 14th of Sept, 1654, by a decree of the Council in the case of Johannes Van Beeck, "who was married to Maria Varleth at Green- wich, Conn., by an unauthorized farmer named Goodman Crab," the mar- riage was declared unlawful, and the parties ordered to live separate. It is probable that this decree was finally annulled, for, after the death of Van Beeck, Maria was recognized by the court as his lawful widow.
JOHANNES VAN BEECK was probably a younger son of Isaac Van Beeck of Amsterdam, one of the Directors of the West India Company, and per- haps came here with his brothers, Nicholas and Joost Van Beeck, about 1650.§ On the 9th of Sept., 1653, he obtained a deed from Ariaen Keyser of a house and lot in Pearl Street. From the following it appears that he was killed by the Indians in the terrible massacre of September, 1655 : " 9th Nov., 1655, Orphans' Court .- Whereas John Van Beck came to his death by the late misfortune [irruption of the Indians] leaving a widow and minor child, &c." " 16 Nov., 1655, The Court appointed Joost Van Beck, brother of the deceased, and Nicholas Verleth, brother of the widow, guardians, &c., of the child." " 20 Jany., 1656. Joost Van Beck refuses to serve as guardian, as he doubts the legality of the marriage and has a claim against the estate, so both he and Verleth are dismissed, and Paulus L. Van der Grist and Govert Loockermans ap- pointed." | In May, 1656, Joost Van Beeck having obtained a judgment against Maria Varleth, widow of Johannes Van Beeck, she petitioned for its annulment. In the mean time he sued her for slander, to which she paid no attention ; but the Council, on the 3d May, 1656, ordered her ar-
* Register of the Burgomasters and Schepens, etc., Valentine's Manual, 1844-5, pp. 306-8.
+ Valentine's Manual, 1853, pp. 443-444-
# Cal. N. Y Hist. MSS. Dutch, pp. 135, 136, 141, 162. 165, 167, 378.
§ In a letter from the Directors at Amsterdam, dated April 18, 1651, Gov. Stuyvesant was instructed that permission had been given the agents of Gerard Smith, Nicolas and Joost Van Beeck to select lands for their colonies in New Netherland and one or two lots in the Manhattans (Cal. N. Y. Hist. MSS. Dutch, p. 276). Joost Van Beeck Isaacksen and his wife, Maria Anna Saffe, had a son, Petrus, bap. in New Amsterdam, August 22, 1655. He probably returned to Holland with his family before the English conquest.
Minutes of the Orphans' Court, pp. 5, 7, and 12. I am indebted to William Clarkson, Esq., of New York, for the above memorandum, and also for valuable data relating to the Brockholst family.
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rest for contempt in not answering his complaint. No further reference to the matter appears, and probably here her legal troubles ended. Johan- nes Van Beeck and Maria Varleth2 had issue, one daughter :
1. JUDITH VAN BEECK, bap. May 9, 1655. She m. in Willemstadt (Al- bany) August 29, 1674, GABRIEL MINVIELLE, a native of Bordeaux in France. They both joined the Dutch Church in New York, Dec. 13, 1674. He afterwards became a communicant of the French Church, but returned to the Dutch Church again June 1, 1676. His wife's name not appearing with his at the latter date, and there being no further account of her, it is supposed that she died the year after her marriage, without issue. He was a merchant, one of the prominent men of his time, and Mayor of New York in 1684. He married, second, m. 1. dated Jan. 25, 1676-7, Susanna, dau. of John Lawrence, and died in Sept., 1702, leaving no children. His widow married William Smith, m. 1. dated Dec. 22, 1702.
MARIA VARLETH2 m. second, Nov. 29, 1658, PAULUS SCHRICK, a native of Neurenberg (Nuremburg). He is noticed by Mr. Savage as of " Hartford, one of the little colony of Dutch from New York, that had planted before the English went thither," and his wife's name mistakenly given as " Mary, widow of Josephus Ambeck." On the 29th of Oct., 1652, he obtained a deed from Claes Janszen Van Naerden of a lot in Pearl Street in New Amsterdam, and was, perhaps, a resident here for a short time, his name first appearing in the records Dec. 24, 1651, as a sponsor at the baptism of Warnar, son of Hendrick Van Diepenbroeck. He was a merchant-a Free Trader-and resided chiefly at Hartford, Conn., until his death in 1663. His son Paulus was born there, and probably his daughter Susanna Maria, though both were baptized in New Amsterdam. He is frequently styled de Heer, or the Honorable, in the records, and was an important personage among the burghers of New Amsterdam and Beverwyck (Albany), to which places, and to Holland, his trading enterprises extended. Paulus Schrick and Maria Varleth2 had issue, one daughter and son, both baptized in the Dutch Church in New Amsterdam the same day, viz. :
I. SUSANNA MARIA SCHRICK, bap. Sep. 2, 1663. Her second name, Maria, is dropped in the record of her marriage and baptism of her chil- dren. She joined the Dutch Church in New York, Nov. 30, 1676, and mar- ried at Albany, May 2, 1681, CAPT. ANTHONY BROCKHOLST .* This name was usually spelled Brockholes, but the Captain's autographs in the Secre- tary of State's office at Albany are written Brockholls, in the records of the New York Dutch Church it is Brockholst, Broeckholt, Brockholt, Brochols, Brochold, and Brokholes, while in the Surrogate's office it is written Broc- holst and BROCKHOLST, which latter seems to have been the name pre- ferred by his descendants.
When the Duke of York commissioned Major Edmund Andros in 1674 as his Lieutenant and Governor, Lieut. Anthony Brockholst, in case of his death, was to succeed him in the government of New York and its depen- dencies. Of a Roman Catholic family in Lancashire, England, seated at Claughton for many centuries, he was "a profest Papist." He was a member of Andros' first Council, and in his temporary absence from New York in 1677-8, administered the government. He succeeded Sylves- ter Salisbury, who died in the winter of 1680, as Commandant at Albany, and on the departure of Andros for England, in January, 1681, was appointed by special commission Commander-in-Chief, etc., of the New York Govern-
* Pearson's First Settlers of Albany, p. 27.
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ment, in which capacity he acted until the arrival of Gov. Dongan, in August, 1683. He was also a member of Dongan's Council, and in 1684 bore the title of Major. In October, 1688, he accompanied Gov. Andros on his journey to New England, and was left in command of Fort Charles (Pemaquid), Maine, in March, 1689, from whence he was sent to Boston the following month. In January, 1690, Lieut .- Gov. Leisler ordered his arrest, but it does not appear that he suffered much on this account .* On the 11th of Nov., 1695, Major Anthony Brockholst and Capt. Arent Schuyler, in be- half of themselves and their associates, Samuel Bayard, George Ryerson, John Mead, Samuel Berrie, David and Hendrick Mandeville, obtained a Patent (having purchased, June 6, 1695, the Indian title to the same) for 5,500 acres of land from the East Jersey proprietors at Pacquanac, now known as Pompton Plains, Morris County, N. J.+ He was after- wards reported in June, 1696, as one of the ten Roman Catholics residing in the city of New York, but in that or the following year he and Arent Schuyler settled permanently on their Jersey lands in the Pompton valley, on the east side of the river, and were, in all probability, the pioneers in that region of country. He was living at Pompton in June, 1710, and is sup- posed to have died in 1723. An allusion is made to the exemplification of Major Brockholt's will in a letter of Michael Kearney to Isaac Bobin, dated at Perth Amboy, Sept. 5, 1723,į but where the original was entered of record we have been unable to ascertain. His wife was living April 8, 1722, and was at that date a sponsor at the baptism in the Dutch Church, in New York, of Anna dau. of Philip French. Anthony Brockholst and his wife Susanna Schrick had seven children baptized in the Dutch Church, at New York, and one in Albany. Beside these, they had a son Henry, whose baptism is unrecorded. Only Mary, Henry, Judith, Susanna and Jannetie or Johanna, of their children, were living in November, 1701, the date of Maria (Varleth) Teller's will. Issue :
I. MARIA BROCKHOLST, born July 5, bap. July 29, 1682. She never married. Her will is dated Sept. 12, 1761, proven July 25, 1766. She d. June 10, 1766. In her will she styles herself Mary Brockholst, of the city of New York, Spinster ; names her three nieces, viz. : Anna wife of David Van Horne ; Susanna the wife of William Livingston ; and Elizabeth the wife of David Clarkson, the children of her deceased sister Susanna for- merly the wife of Philip French ; also refers to the children, without naming them, of her late niece Mary Browne, late wife of the Hon. William Browne of Beverly, in New England, who was also a dau. of her said deceased sister Susanna; names her nephews, Frederick and Philip Philipse, and her two nieces, Susanna wife of Beverly Robinson, and Mary wife of Roger Morris, the children of her sister Johanna wife of the late Col. Frederick Philipse. Appoints David Van Horne, Beverly Robinson, William Livingston and David Clarkson, Executors.
2. HENRY BROCKHOLST, born Dec. 28, 1684 ; m. MARIA VERPLANCK, probably the daughter of Samuel (and Ariaentie) Verplanck, who was bap. Sept. 2, 1692. But little of his personal history has been gleaned, and the Clarksons of New York, a model of family history, is the only work, save Schenk's Historical Discourse at Pompton, N. J., in which we have found his name even alluded to. He was a sponsor at the bap. in the Dutch
* Brodhead's History of New York, vol. 2, Index. Burke's Landed Gentry.
+ Schenk's Hist. Discourse at Pompton Plains, 1871.
# Cal. N. Y. Hist. MSS. English, p. 480.
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Church in New York, Feb. 3, 1723, of Susanna, dau. of Frederick Philipse ; also at the bap. Jan. 1, 1725, of Elizabeth, dau. of Philip French, and Sept. 6, 1741, at bap. of Charles, son of Gulian Verplanck. Henry Brockholst Livingston, the fifth son of Gov. William Livingston, of New Jersey, was named after him, he being his maternal uncle. He resided probably all his life in New Jersey. In 1755, a division of a part of the land acquired by his father in 1695 at Pompton was made between him and Philip, son of Arent Schuyler, and the sons of Samuel Bayard. His will is recorded at Trenton. His property was bequeathed to his nephews and nieces, the same as his sister Mary's. He died March 4, 1766.
MARIA VERPLANCK, wife of Henry Brockholst, was a sponsor with David Clarkson at the bap. July 13, 1735, of Anthony, son of Frederick Philipse. At the bap. of Adriana, dau. of Gulian and Maria (Crommelin) Verplanck, July 13, 1748, Charles Crommelin and his wife, Maria Brock- holst, were sponsors. It is not improbable that this Maria Brockholst, of whom we have no other mention, was the dau. of Henry and Maria (Ver- planck) Brockholst, and the first wife of Charles Crommelin, his second being Sarah Roosevelt, whom he married Sept. 29, 1750.
Mary Brocholst, of the city of New York, widow (prob. the widow of Henry Brockholst), made will dated March 9, 1775 ; proven Dec. 17, 1784 ; names her friend, Mrs. Margaret Stuyvesant, wife of Peter Stuyvesant, and their two daughters, Judith and Cornelia, to each of whom she makes a small bequest, devising the residue of her estate to her nephews, Samuel and Gulian Verplanck, and her nieces, Ann Ludlow, wife of Gabriel Lud- low, and Mary McEvers, wife of Charles McEvers. Appoints her nephews, Samuel and Gulian Verplanck, Executors.
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