USA > New York > Famous families of New York; historical and biographical sketches of families which in successive generations have been identified with the development of the nation, Vol. II > Part 15
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Less distinguished, perhaps, than Stephen III., the eighth Patroon, were his kinsmen, Jeremiah, Colonel Kiliaen, Kiliaen K., and Solomon. Jeremiah was born in 1741, was graduated from Princeton College in 1758, and took part in the Revolution. Distinguished as a member of Congress, he represented New York from 1789 to 1791. He was Lieutenant-Governor from 1801 to 1804.
Colonel Kiliaen Van Rensselaer, a grandson of Jeremiah III., son of the first Patroon, who succeeded his brother Jan Baptist as di- Col. Kiliaen rector of the Colony of Rensselaerwyck (1658), was an ardent patriot in Revolutionary days. At the outbreak of hostilities he joined the colonial forces and took with him three of his sons, leaving behind only those who were too young to go to war. He and his boys served with heroism, he being known as " Fighting Kiliaen " ( or " Colonel Kiliaen ") during the conflict and afterwards, as long as he lived. He was complimented by Washington. Kiliaen K. Van Rensselaer, son of Colonel Kiliaen K. Kiliaen, was a Yale graduate, and in college he achieved a high reputation for scholarship. After graduation he became private secretary to General Schuyler, who had married his cousin. In his leisure he studied law. He entered the bar and belonged to a famous group of jurists, which included James Kent, De Witt Clinton, and Ambrose Spencer. He was elected to Congress in 1801, and was re-elected four times. Chief among his descendants may be mentioned the Rev. Dr. Maunsell Van Rensse-
Dr. Maunsell laer, the Episcopal divine, President of De Veaux Col- lege, and thereafter of Hobart College, who was born in Albany, 1819.
In 1876, he resigned the presidency of Hobart College and went to Europe. He occupied the pulpits of Emanuel Church and the
Cornelia Paterson Wife of Stephen Van Rensselaer III. From a miniature
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Dan Rensselaer
American Chapel at Geneva, the corner-stone of which was laid by Gen. U. S. Grant. He was afterwards connected with many philanthropies.
Solomon Van Rensselaer was also a soldier in the eighteenth century. He enlisted when but nineteen years old, and served under General Wayne, in 1794. In 1799, he was promoted to be major, and was Adjutant-General of New York from 1801 to 1810. He fought bravely through the War of 1812, and ended his military career by becoming a Congressman, from 1819 to 1822.
A celebrated junior line from Jeremias, third son of the first Patroon, has added many names to the roll of honor. One of these begins with his great-grandson Major James Van Rensse- laer, who fought bravely in the Revolution, enjoyed the Major James confidence of Washington, and at one time served under Gen. Mont- gomery. From him comes the line marked by Philip, Gratz, and Cortlandt Van Rensselaer, formerly United States District Attorney in this city. The records of the eighteenth century show at least seventy members of the family besides those enumerated.
Mention should be made of Colonel Stephen, son of Brigadier- General Henry, a brilliant soldier on General Scott's staff during the civil conflict, whose heroism has adorned the history of Reverend
that giant struggle ; of Rev. Cortlandt, son of Rev. Cortlandt Cortlandt, a noted Presbyterian divine, a war chaplain and an efficient secretary of the Presbyterian Board ; of Philip Livingston, another son of Rev. Cortlandt who made a laudable war record ; of William, son of William P., an officer in the U. S. Volunteers ; and of Stephen Van Rensselaer Cruger, a brilliant soldier. The five were grandsons of Stephen and his wife, Cornelia Paterson. To this generation belongs James Tallmadge (son of Philip S. and his wife Mary B. Tallmadge), who was U. S. Assistant District Attorney for New York.
The Van Rensselaer fame will rest more upon political than upon personal grounds. Were every member of the race annihil- ated the story of the family would be preserved by all students of jurisprudence. Many attempts were made toward establishing aristocracies of various types in the New World. In Maine, when
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it was Acadia, the French endeavored to reproduce upon a small scale the social features of the ancien régime. In Mexico, both Church and State essayed the creation of ecclesiastical and Castil- ian tenures. The experiments of Lord Delaware and other English nobles are well known. None of these came to any notable suc- cess, but the plans of the great Kiliaen Van Rensselaer were made with consummate skill and executed with magnificent power. He and his descendants ruled with wisdom and justice. If ever a feudal aristocracy could have been perpetuated in the New World, they were the men to perform the task. The abolition of the double title of Patroon and Lord of the Manor was the first blow which the spirit of the New World administered to their cherished designs. Though the titles were abolished by the Revolution, the system remained unchanged. Even as late as 1812 it looked as if the Pa- troon system were to become a factor in the social development of the Empire State. The anti-rent agitation, followed by the legisla- tion which was enacted in Albany between 1845 and 1860, was the second blow which put an end to the last relics of feudal Europe. The Van Rensselaers made a brave fight for the cause with which they were identified, and the last of the Patroons went down in defeat like a gentleman. He himself lived to see the day when his representatives at Albany and Washington were the descendants of the oath-bound underlings of his ancestors. It took two hun- dred years for John Smith to take the Patroon from the manorial chair, and to carve the manor into ten thousand independent little farms. Yet in this change the heroic qualities of the Van Rensse- laers were developed and made greater. Those who fought in the Revolution were a higher and finer type than those who first ruled the poor farmers of Rensselaerwyck, and with the final crash the newer generation took up the great work of life with a zeal and manhood worthy of any race.
Van Siclen
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XLI VAN SICLEN
HE consolidation of Brooklyn with New A) York was merely the legal recognition of a very ancient fact. From the founding of New Amsterdam the two boroughs have been organic parts of the same community. Indeed, Brook- lyn up to the middle of the nineteenth D century was more intimately asso- ciated with New York proper than were Haarlem and the settlements beyond that river, which now make a continuous city from the Battery to Yonkers. Nowhere is this better evidenced than in the history of the old families. Both boroughs have equal claims upon the Livingstons, Schermerhorns, Remsens, Kings, Schencks, and Van- derbilts. To this class belongs the ancient Dutch race of Van Siclen, which crossed the ocean to the New Netherlands in the middle of the seventeenth century, and has been an influential ele- ment in the development of the community up to the present time. Like most of the old Holland names, the orthography of the patro- nymic has varied considerably. Among the forms which it has assumed may be enumerated Van Sicklen, Van Sichlen, Van Siclen, Van Sickelen, Van Siechelen, Van Sychlen, Van Scyklen, Van Syckle, Vansyckel, and Van Sickle. Several branches have dropped the Van and simplified the name to Sickel and Sickles.
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In Holland, the family belonged to the agricultural class, and held many positions indicative of importance in the State. They were Syndics, Burgomasters, elders and deacons, lieutenants and captains, merchants and divines. Anthony van Sicklen was one of the Protestants who emigrated from Catholic Belgium (from Ghent), in 1566, to Protestant Holland, where he became a Coun- cillor from the province of Zeeland, representing that province and signing the Pacification of Ghent, with William the Silent and the other Dutch representatives. For three centuries at least, in the Old World, they were noted for their physical vigor and soldierly qualities. They seemed to enjoy war for its excitement and glory rather than for ambition or gain. They took part in every war wherein the Netherlands were engaged, and supplied many free lances to other nations. They were in the armies of Gustavus, of the Duke of Burgundy, the Kings of France, and Charles V., the great Emperor of Germany. Military life is closely connected with the nomadic instinct. The soldier has no home and is called by both duty and inclination to march from camp to camp and country to country. This nomadic instinct appeared in the history of the Van Siclens in the New World. In the seventeenth cen- tury they seemed to have visited all of the settlements of the New Netherlands, and in the eighteenth to have been among the explorers and pioneers of the unbroken West.
The founder was Ferdinandus [1635], who at the age of seven- teen came to New Amsterdam, where he stayed a year or more,
Ferdinandus and then settled in Flatlands, Long Island. Here he the Founder soon had a large farm, and was doing a profitable business with Brooklyn and New Amsterdam. He married Eva Antonise Jansen, by whom he had three sons and five daughters. These children were strong and sturdy and must have been of invaluable service to their parents. In the Dutch families at that time the boys aided the father upon the land and with the live stock, while the girls helped the mother in the care of the house, the management of the poultry-yard and dairy, and in spinning, weaving, and dyeing.
The father of Eva, the wife of Ferdinandus, was Antony
The Old Van Sicklen House in Ghent, Belgium Built about 1338, and still standing
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Jansen, known as Antony Jansen van Salee, and sometimes as Antony Jansen van Fez, from his having lived for some time in Morocco at the cities of Salee and Fez ; he had carried out practically the motto of his Beggars' Badge: "Liver Turc dan Paus," (literally, " Rather Turk than Papist "), becoming a free- booter and capturing Spanish and other Catholic ships. This Beggars' Badge, which is in the possession of Mr. George W. van Siclen, was one of the most famous coins or badges of Europe, being in the shape of a crescent, and having on the obverse the other motto: "En tout fidelle au Roi" (In all things faithful to the king). This was the motto of the Dutch Protestants who re- belled against the Spanish Inquisition, yet claimed to remain faithful to Philip 11. The crescent was the badge of the " Beggars of the Sea," while the badge of the "Gueux" or Beggars of the Land had for motto, "En tout fidèle au roi jusqu'à porter la besace " (In all things faithful to the king, even to carrying a beggar's sack), because a Spanish count, when Brederode and the Dutch nobles came to King Philip's representative with a petition against the Inquisition, said, scornfully: "Here come those beggars." The latter badge had the portrait of Philip Il. on one side, and on the reverse a beggar's sack with two hands clasped through the strap, and pendant from the sides of the metal badge two metal gourds or bottles, and from the bottom, a cup; at Mr. van Siclen's suggestion this was adopted as the badge of the Holland Society of New York, and is made by Tiffany from a model sent by the Numismatic Society of Amsterdam. Antony Jansen van Salee was called "The Turk," and received from Governor William Kieft a grant of land where Bensonhurst now stands; it is known to this day in the abstracts of title as "The Turk's Plan- tation." A brazier of his is in the possession of Mr. Robert Bayles, president of the Market & Fulton National Bank, of New York, to whom it descended from Johannes Gulick, who married a daughter of Ferdinandus van Sicklen. From Ferdinandus [1635] and his wife Eva are descended all the Van Siclens in America. Before 1566, the Van Sicklen family were living in Ghent continuously from A.D. 1338, and prior, often serving as échevins, or members
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of the city council. George van Sicklen was abbot of St. Bavon, A. D. 1405. The family were Normans and came to Ghent from Amiens. A stone residence is standing in Ghent to-day (1902) which was standing there in A. D. 1338, and is and always has been known as "De Groote Sickele " and " La Grande Faucille," belonging to the Van Sicklen family; it has lately been purchased by the municipality of Ghent and is to be used as a museum of antiquities; it is built of rough-hewn stone, " Belgian pavement," and is about one hundred feet square.
Not far from the Van Siclen homestead (near Van Siclen Station on the Brooklyn Elevated) was the settlement of the Canarsie Indians, who proved kind neighbors, and a warm friend- ship sprang up between them and the family. The children used the camp as a playground, and picked up a knowledge of the Indian tongue. This idle accomplishment had singular conse- quences. In each generation during the following century at least one Van Siclen was the official interpreter of the Dutch, and after- wards of the British Government. Several of them became so much attached to the redmen that they left their homes and lived with and ruled the latter. One of them, tradition says, became a titular chief, and transmitted his complimentary title through several generations.
The three sons played prominent parts in their time. They and their father were among the moving spirits in the establish- ment of a market and fair in Brooklyn. This was patterned after the jovial town-fairs of Holland, and proved a thorough success. On fair days the grounds about the market were covered with booths, tents, and Indian wigwams, the farmhouses held open hospitality, and in the afternoon and evening music and dancing gave pleasure to the young, and pipes, beer, and wine to the old. It was the first collective attempt on the part of the community to cater to the social side of life in this part of the New Netherlands. These fairs must have been a pleasant spectacle. The rosy- cheeked girls, fresh from the farms, attired in gayly-colored dresses, with heavy jewelry and voluminous linen petticoats, the stalwart young farmers in their traditional Dutch garb, soldiers and sailors,
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merchants and their families from neighboring towns, with a sprinkling of Indians through the crowd, must have made a pictu- resque ensemble. The records show that many visitors came from New York, some of whom took part in the dancing and festivities.
Of the three sons, Reinier [born about 1659] remained at home; Johannes, the scholar, became a schoolmaster in Flatbush; and Ferdinandus, Jr., settled upon a farm in the neighborhood, and became a notable Indian interpreter and farmer.
Johannes was a popular pedagogue, and enjoyed the respect and affection of his townsmen. To be a teacher in those days meant much more, in view of the environment, than it Johannes the does to-day. He was second only to the pastor, and Schoolmaster in some respects played a larger part than the latter. A fair idea of his duties, as well as of the social conditions of the latter part of the seventeenth century, may be obtained from the Flat- bush schoolmaster's agreement of 1682:
"(1.) The school shall begin at eight o'clock, and goe out at 11; shall begin again at one o'clock and ende at four. The belle shall be rung before the school begins.
"(2.) When school opens one of the children shall reade the morning prayer as it stands in the catechism, and close with the prayer before dinner; and in the afternoon the same. The evening school shall begin with the Lord's prayer and close by singing a psalm.
"(3.) Hee shall instruct the children in the common prayers and questions and answers off the catechism, on wednesdays and saturdays, too enable them to saye them better on sunday in church.
" (4.) Hee shall be bound to keepe the school nine months in succession from September to June, one year with another, and shall always be present himself.
"(5.) Hee shall bee Chorister of the Church, ring the belle three times before service, and reade a chapter of the Bible in the Church between the second and third ringinge of the belle; after
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the third ringinge hee shall reade the ten commandments, and the twelve articles of Ffaith, and then sett the Psalm. In the after- noon, after the third ringinge of the belle, hee shall reade a short chapter or one of the Psalms of David, as the congregation are assemblinge; afterward he shall sett the psalm.
·
"(7.) Hee shall provide a basin of water for the baptisme, for which hee shall receive 12 stuyvers in wampum for every bap- tisme Ffrom parents or sponsers. Hee shall furnish bread and wine Ffor the Communion att the charge of the Church. Hee shall also serve as Messenger Ffor the Consistorie.
"(8.) Hee shall give the Funerale invitations and toll the bell, and Ffor which hee shall receive Ffor persons of 15 years of age and upwards 12 guilders, and Ffor persons under 15, 8 guilders, and if hee shall cross the river to New York, hee shall have four guilders more."
· The school money was paid as follows:
"(1.) Hee shall receive Ffor a speller or reader 3 guilders, and Ffor a writer 4 guilders Ffor the day school. In the evening 4 guilders Ffor a speller and reader, and 5 guilders Ffor a writer per quarter.
"(2.) The residue of his salary shall bee 400 guilders in wheat off wampum value delivered at Brookland ferry, with the dwell- ing, pasturage, and meadow appertaining to the school."
Johannes, after several years' service, moved to Jersey, where he was followed shortly afterwards by his nephew, Jan. Here he established the New Jersey branch, which was to become one of the great families of that State.
In the third generation the leading figures were Cornelius of Gravesend, who in middle life bought a large tract of land in Reinier Amentrem, Huntingdon County, N. J .; Ferdinand of of Flatbush Gravesend, who was a prosperous farmer and real estate owner; Reinier of Flatbush, who was a farmer, merchant, and public official; Ferdinand of Flatlands, who married Mary
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Van Nuyse, increased the ancestral estate, and had property at Canarsie and in Queens County; Jan of Raritan, who was the possessor of a large estate, and was a leading man in that part of Jersey. All married and had large and vigorous families.
The fourth generation witnessed the continuation of the prosperity enjoyed by the third, and a wider distribution of the members. Reinier [1716] was a leader of Gravesend and Flat- lands. Gysbert [1718] was a large landed proprietor in Grave- send. Johannes [1722] had a fine establishment at New Lots, and Cornelius [1728] was one of the wealthiest farmers at Wap- pinger's Falls, N. Y. Reinier was a selectman in Huntingdon County, N. J. Andries [1718] was a justice at Raritan, Judge Andries N. J. Johannes [1720] was an influential farmer, soldier, and trader at Brunswick. Abraham [1723] founded a family in Philadelphia. Jacobus settled in Albany, and Peter began life in New York City.
The fifth and sixth generations covered the most important event of the eighteenth century, the War of Independence, and afforded opportunity for many of the family to display military skill and patriotic virtue. One of these was Peter, son Peter the
of Peter, who served under General George Clinton. Pioneer He was wounded several times, but invariably reported for duty before his wound had completely healed. On one occasion he was sent back because he was still unable to use a gun. At the close of the war he joined a party of adventurous soldiers who went West and established settlements along the Ohio River. Here he made a record as a pioneer, and founded a branch in the "Buckeye " State. Ferdinand of Wappinger's Falls, N. Y., was a well-to-do patriot, who contributed largely to the Revolutionary cause. He belonged to the militia of the place, and is said to have taken part in the battle of Saratoga.
Lieutenant Abraham [1775] was a soldier, farmer, and musi- cian. He served in the War of 1812, where he displayed great valor. He settled in Orange County, N. Y., where he Lieutenant established a local branch of his race. Captain James Abraham [1790], of the Jacobus line, also served faithfully in the same war.
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Captain Joseph [1797], of the Reinier branch, enlisted, when a mere lad, in the army, where he rose to be captain. In later life he removed to Michigan, where he made a permanent Captain Joseph home, and where his descendants are now quite numerous. He was Captain of the Belvedere Rangers, and when receiving his honorary discharge from General Jackson was highly praised by that great soldier.
The'seventh and eighth generations supplied many soldiers to the armies of the Union. More than one hundred appear upon
Sergeant
the rolls. Of these, the more conspicuous were: Rich-
De Witt ard Henry [1827], of the Abraham branch, who served
Clinton
in the Forty-second Illinois; Sergeant De Witt Clinton [1816], of the Andrew branch, who was a brilliant soldier in the Black Hawk War, where he made himself famous as an Indian Lieutenant fighter; Lieutenant Moses E. [1815], his brother, who
Moses E. won the military laurels of the family. When seven- teen years old, he enlisted in the Black Hawk War; in 1846, he marched to Mexico and served through that struggle, and, in 1861, he was one of the first to offer himself to the national Gov- ernment. He inherited the Van Siclen talent for Indian languages, and served as Government interpreter for many years. Lyman, of the Peter branch, a cavalryman from Michigan during the Civil War, was captured by the Confederates, and died from jail fever in Andersonville.
John Sydney [1827], son of De Witt Clinton, was another hero of the great conflict, where his career was altogether unique. John Sydney He was captured at the beginning of the war, and the Pioneer taken to Selma, Ala. Here he contrived a plan of escape, which was discovered. He was forthwith removed to Meridian, Miss., where he with other prisoners built a tunnel and fled to the woods. He was recaptured and returned to his former place of captivity. Here he designed another jail escape, but was transferred to Cahaba, Ala. Twice again did he try to break his confinement, and was each time transferred, first to Selma and thence to Vicksburg. Here at last he was exchanged, and im- mediately went back to the front. His boast was that he "had
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done time in seven Southern prisons." George Washington [1841], of the Peter branch, enlisted in 1862, and was discharged at the end of the war with the rank of corporal. He was one of the company which captured Jefferson Davis after the fall of Richmond.
At the present time the family is represented by the eighth and ninth generations. Of these, the chief is George West [1840], who was graduated from the College of the City of New York (1857) and the Columbia Law School (1867), George West and was admitted to the bar, where he achieved success in real- estate law. He was the founder of the Title Guarantee and Trust Company of New York; founder and first Secretary of the Hol- land Society of New York and the first Secretary of the Holland Trust Company of New York. He married Sarah Gregory, by whom he has issue. Three years after her death, in 1901, he married Grace C. Hogarth.
Arthur, son of George West, was graduated from Columbia Law School [1891] and was admitted to the bar; Matthew, his other son, is a senior at Amherst. James Cornell, of the Reinier branch, was graduated from the Columbia Law School in 1892. Judge Bennett Van Syckel of the Supreme Court of New Jersey is a jurist of the highest rank. And John T. Van Sickle, manager of the Morgan S. S. line to New Orleans, is long known for his executive ability.
At the present time the family is represented by numerous branches in the Empire State and elsewhere. It has members at its old homesteads in Flatlands, Gravesend, and Brooklyn, as well as in Queens, Manhattan, and the Bronx. It is uniformly marked by the old Dutch virtues-patience, industry, resolute probity, and a deep love for education.
Wendell
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XLII
WENDELL
N the first century of the Hudson River settlements, it was rare for either Knickerbocker or Englishman to move eastward and invade the sterile terri- tory of the Puritan. To the stout burghers of New Amsterdam, New England was a rocky land peopled by wild Indians, wild beasts, and wilder Englishmen. It was rarer still for a Dutch family to become identified with New England life, and to attain as much celebrity in Massachusetts as the main branch did in New York. Yet this is what occurred with the great Dutch family of Wendell, one of the most distin- guished of the colonial stocks of the Empire State. Not alone under their own name did they make history in the Bay State, but in their two immortal descendants, Oliver Wendell Holmes and Wendell Phillips, they added two great stars to the heavens of American intellectuality.
The founder of the race in the New World was Evert Janse, who was born [1615] in the little city of Embden in East Friesland, then belonging to the Netherlands, but now part of the Evert Janse province of Aurich, in the kingdom of Hanover, Ger- the Founder many. Embden was not the home of his race. Not many years before, his family had lived in the district of Rhynland or
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