XI. Van der Poel – Verplanck – Vigne

We resume our study of the Vanderpool family with Abraham Vanderpool's father, Wynant van der Poel (as it was still being spelled). Wynant's parents were MELGERT¹ WYNANTSE VAN DER POEL and ARIAANTJE {VERPLANCK} VAN DER POEL, who were married on December 4, 1668.² Some Vanderpool family researchers state that Melgert and Ariaantje were born or baptized (Melgert in Fort Orange/Rensselaerswyck) on the same day, December 2, 1646. I think this is not correct, principally because it appears that Melgert's parents were still living in Amsterdam as late as December of 1652. Melgert had already been born by then, for baptismal records in Amsterdam suggest his birth occurred in late 1643: Melgert's parents had two males baptized as Melgerts or Melchert, one in the New Church on August 9, 1641, and another in the Old Church on November 26, 1643.³ The Melgert who married Ariaantje and fathered Wynant is probably the latter child, named – as was the custom – the same as his older brother because the latter had died.

Melgert van der Poel's home in Albany was located on the south side of State Street and is said to have abutted "the fort." This was presumably Fort Albany, begun in 1676, although the reference is vague enough to pertain to the stockade that was built in 1659.⁴ Melgert was a "gun stocker," someone who fabricated the wooden stocks for guns whose metal parts were imported from Europe. (Albany also had a man who made gunlocks, and presumably he and Melgert maintained a business relationship.) Clearly he traded with the Indians as well: on one occasion he was fined for having Indians "in his residence," which the authorities regarded as prima facie evidence that one was engaged in illegal trade in furs. In addition, both Melgert and his father signed petitions advocating freer trade with the Indians. Like his father, Melgert also sawed lumber into boards – first for one of his father's competitors, whose sawmill he later purchased, and then for himself. He acquired a house and lot from his father on March 31, 1679, using as credit wages Melgert had earned in his father's employ.⁵

Melgert van der Poel seems to have been a solid citizen of Albany, one of a small (no more than thirty) group of Dutch traders, merchants, and artisans who formed the core of the Dutch community that after the English conquest found itself somewhat uneasily confronted by "foreign" rule. The sons of Albert Bradt and Abraham Verplanck were also in this group, which was bound together as neighbors, commercial partners, and in-laws. Most of them lived in a small area below the new English fort atop the hill in Albany, now the site of the state capitol building. This Dutch community would continue to dominate life in Albany for many years.

In 1683 Melgert and his father, along with Albert Bradt, are listed among those pledging modest sums toward the salary of a new minister for the Dutch Reformed Church, and in 1686 Melgert served as an assistant alderman in Albany; later he was a juror and a firemaster.⁶ Although he is not listed by name on the census of Albany taken in June 1697, it is probable that he is the Melgert Wendell whose place of residence and family seem to match those of Melgert van der Poel. Melgert van der Poel also signed a loyalty oath that year.

Sometime toward the end of his life, he may have moved to Kinderhook, in Columbia County, New York, perhaps as a consequence of his son's having married (1696) the daughter of a man with extensive land holdings there.⁷ There exists a deed dated March 9, 1694, recording Melgert's purchase (from the Dutch Reformed Church) of the water rights at a sawmill "below the falls" on Bevers Kill, and in 1702 he is listed among the freeholders of Albany who welcomed a new governor. If he did move to Kinderhook, then, it must not have been until after this date. His will mentions the sawmill and two slaves.

Melgert van der Poel died in Albany in 1710, reportedly having sired children right up to the last year of his life.⁸ After Ariaantje had died, evidently about 1690, Melgert was married again, on June 29, 1692. His second wife was named Elizabeth {Teller} van Tricht van der Poel.⁹

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Before we follow the Vanderpool line any farther back, we will pause to examine the Verplanck¹⁰ line of Melgert's wife, Ariaantje. Information contributed to the LDS IGI shows Ariaantje was baptized on December 2, 1646, probably in New Amsterdam. Her parents, ABRAHAM ISAACSE VERPLANCK and MARIA {VIGNE} VERPLANCK, are said to have been married in New Amsterdam about 1634.¹¹ Abraham was born about 1606 in the Netherlands. Maria was born about 1608 to 1610 in Valenciennes, France, a city known for its fine laces – and its Huguenots. One source suggests that she was born in St. Waast-la-Haut, a town about a dozen miles east of Valenciennes where her father may also have beeb born. Both Abraham and Maria {Vigne} Verplanck died in Albany, Maria in 1670 or 1671 and Abraham about 1691.¹²

We do not know exactly when Abraham Verplanck arrived in New Netherland. The first definite reference to him comes from a map in the Library of Congress, which shows that in 1639 he owned a tract of land at Pouwells Hoek in what is today Jersey City and Hoboken, New Jersey, directly across the Hudson River from New Amsterdam. This strategic property included a point where the Indian trails came together at a customary crossing point for those going to Manhattan Island. The area, which included a large portion of the shoreline of New Jersey and also some of Staten Island, had been patented by a man named Pauw – hence its original name of Pavonia and present name of Paulus Hook. Pauw had hoped to become a patroon but did not succeed and so sold his rights to the West India Company, which in turn sold the land.¹³

Abraham Verplanck was the first to take advantage of the opportunity to buy land in Pavonia. He obtained a patent for his property from Director Willem Kieft on May 1, 1638, and Abraham and his wife probably lived there for a few years – perhaps until the little settlement was devastated in the fighting between Indians and the Dutch during the early 1640s that we will discuss below. By 1643 Abraham had rented out his land, after which he mortgaged it and possibly lost it through foreclosure. He may well have decided that rebuilding after the Indians laid waste to it was not worth the expense and let the property be taken in order to satisfy the debt.

Around 1640, then, Abraham and Maria were living on Manhattan Island. One place they lived, which Abraham apparently obtained by a grant from the West India Company in 1646, was a rather small lot immediately adjacent to the five stone houses that served as the Company's business headquarters – one of the most desirable locations in the town. These houses, a major landmark in the little town, were built about 1635 some two hundred feet east of the wall of the fort.¹⁴ The small lane on which Verplanck's lot and house were located later became, and still is called, Bridge Street. The property was just to the northeast of what is now Whitehall Street and southwest of what is now Broad Street.¹⁵

How long Abraham lived on Bridge Street is not clear (his property apparently was subsequently taken by the Company for a marketplace), but in 1649 he seems to have purchased property north on The Strand, which is now Pearl Street. This relatively large lot, which fronted on Pearl and went back to higher ground away from the East River, was located in what was termed The Ferry or Smith's Vly (Valley).¹⁶ Abraham's property here is now covered by the intersection of Pearl Street and Fulton Street (the latter having been driven through it to the river early in the 19th century.)¹⁷

In truth it is sometimes difficult to determine exactly where Abraham did live, for on some lists in the court minutes he seems to be listed with those residing on or near Bridge Street and on others he is clearly shown as living in Smith's Valley. He may in fact have spent some of his time living in Albany (where his son Isaac was born in 1651) or else engaged in trade along the Hudson River or down on the Delaware River, which the Dutch called the South River. His name appears in the records of New Amsterdam from time to time, as when he is assessed a portion of the costs of repairing the fort or when he claims damages owing to a survey that was made. He was among the 40 or so citizens who in 1653 contributed, albeit modestly in his case, to the fund that erected the wall for which Wall Street is named. (The contributions were in actuality loans at 10% interest; there is no record of their being repaid, so perhaps New York City owes Verplanck's descendants quite a bit of money.)

In 1659 Abraham Verplanck was among nine householders chosen to hang leather fire buckets (a dozen each) for ready access in case of fire – what one book has described as "the first systematic attempt to create a fire department in New Amsterdam." In 1664 he was one of 93 residents who signed the remonstrance urging Director Stuyvesant to surrender the city to the British rather than risk its destruction in their imminent assault, and afterwards he was one of 272 persons who swore allegiance to the new British rulers. The next year, however, he – like most other residents – went on record refusing the new British governor's request that they billet British troops, a sore point with the conquered Dutch. In 1665 and 1674 Verplanck is mentioned as living in Smith's Valley and apparently remained there until his death in 1691. The reference in 1674 records the fact that Verplanck (and his brother-in-law, Jan Vigne) were being compensated for having their properties near the fort confiscated to strengthen its defenses; the government apparently agreed to build him a house in another part of the city.

Other references to Abraham Verplanck in the records of New Amsterdam involve disputes with other residents, although the disputes do not seem any more serious than most of the other disputes that appear in these records. At other times, though, Abraham Verplanck showed that he could be another of those contentious and cantankerous Dutchmen who seem to populate my family: in 1642, for instance, he tore down certain ordinances posted by the council and director (in the days before newspapers and other media, the only way they could communicate their orders and decisions). As a result of this incident, and what he said afterwards, he was heavily fined.¹⁸

One source describes Abraham Verplanck as a farmer. On the property he bought, rented, or inherited he probably raised tobacco like the other farmers of New Amsterdam, who preferred this easily grown and highly profitable cash crop to agricultural produce. His numerous appearances in the court records, however, suggest that like so many others in New Amsterdam he eventually became a trader and perhaps a merchant of some sort: many of the disputes in which he was a party concern commercial transactions stemming from trading. His wife Maria was a defendant in at least one case, so perhaps the whole family was involved the business. I think the evidence suggests that he also speculated in land, probably renting out the properties that he owned.

This conclusion is reinforced by the fact that in 1646 Abraham and three others (including Jan Vigne) obtained from Director Kieft a sizable grant of land along the west bank of the South River in what is now Pennsylvania. Kieft was eager to see this area settled by the Dutch in order to prevent the Swedish foothold that had been established further south from developing into a rival trading force. The site of Verplanck's grant is about where the Walt Whitman Bridge connects to the Pennsylvania shore of the Delaware River.¹⁹ In July of 1655, Verplanck was one of the 120 men in eleven ships who accompanied Director Stuyvesant in the expedition Stuyvesant led against the Swedes at their stronghold on the South River, Fort Christiana, near present-day Wilmington, Delaware. After the Swedes surrendered their fort, Verplanck signed as a witness to a secret treaty with the Indians in which the Dutch acquired the Indians' lands in that vicinity, and he later claimed some of this land for himself.

Abraham Verplanck was not one of the more prosperous and prominent burghers of New Amsterdam. In 1657 he was one of 238 persons who qualified for or were willing to pay cash for the "small burgher right," which enabled them to engage in trade and hold minor offices.²⁰ Only nineteen persons qualified or paid to become Great Burghers, who could hold the higher offices. Verplanck evidently lost several properties for the debts he owed and mortgaged most or all of his remaining properties, and he may well have been in rather straightened financial circumstances during his final years. (Smith's Valley, where Verplanck lived out his life, was by now a pocket of low-income laborers.) Abraham may also have become enfeebled, since for the first time he now did not sign his name to a document but only put his mark on it. Ironically, Abraham's children did quite well in life (and married well), and both of his sons sired large families that became prominent in the history of New York.²¹

Abraham Verplanck may be most vividly remembered for his involvement in what was probably the most unpleasant chapter in the relationship between the Dutch colony and its neighboring Indian tribes. By 1640 expansion of the new settlement began to squeeze the Lenapes, from whom the Dutch had obtained their land, and the local tribes related to the Lenapes. Director Kieft was pressuring the Indians to pay for their "protection" by the West India Company and its military force, payments the Indians viewed as a form of extortion. Inevitably there was friction as the Lenapes and other tribes were caught in a vise between the Dutch growth and the more powerful tribes to the north. The culmination of the friction was the so-called Pig War of 1641, when some Raritan Indians were accused of killing some marauding swine belonging to settlers in New Amsterdam. Director Kieft decided to exploit the clash as a way of putting further pressure on the Indians, and possibly of eliminating them altogether. He assembled a kind of advisory council called "the Twelve" to help him devise and gain support for an aggressive policy toward the Indians.

Abraham Verplanck was among the men the residents of New Amsterdam chose in 1641 to serve as the Twelve. This group at first advised restraint, then sanctioned a limited punitive expedition to retaliate for the Indians' raids. In return for their willingness to endorse some action against the tribes, though, the Twelve presented Kieft with a petition – the first petition ever drafted in the colony – asking to have the group become a permanent body that would have a say in the colony's governance, as well as for the end of certain restrictions. This was more than Kieft had wanted, so he thanked the Twelve and then proceeded to ignore them.

More clashes in 1642 and 1643 gave Kieft further excuse and opportunity to strike at the Indians. In February of 1643, one of Kieft's sympathizers, after plying three members of the Twelve (including Verplanck) with alcohol, persuaded them to sign a petition – which Kieft had ready – urging an attack on the Wechquaskeek Indians, who were camped in Pavonia. Kieft used the petition to justify the resulting massacre of more than one hundred Wechquaskeek and Hackensack men, women, and children by Dutch soldiers and armed settlers. One book on the subject has described Abraham Verplanck as a "militant" when it came to dealing with the Indians, and it is very likely that he personally participated in this raid on February 25, 1643 – particularly since he had a property interest in the area (which may help to explain his attitude, too). Indeed, one old (1897) book portrays him as the "commander" of the Dutch forces during this war with the Indians, and if that is so he might well have been placed in charge of the soldiers and citizens who attacked the Indians in Pavonia because he knew the territory well. Certainly he would have felt a strong stake in the outcome of the affair.

Kieft's foolish offensive against the Indians (foolish because the Dutch were, after all, a heavily outnumbered minority that depended on the Indians for many things, not least the furs that were the colony's economic engine) backfired when the Indians retaliated. The continuing warfare in 1643 and 1644 left many settlers' properties in ruins, including those in Pavonia. (As we have seen, Verplanck's own holdings were among those damaged in the conflict.) There was heavy loss of life, refugees forced to abandon their properties huddled in the fort, and much of what had been accomplished during the previous dozen years was lost. In addition, perhaps as many as half of those who had come to New Netherland, returned to Europe, and the population of New Amsterdam in particular dropped precipitously.

The warfare that followed Kieft's offensive against the Indians also gave rise to a famous anecdote, repeated for nearly four hundred years now, that involves Abraham Verplanck's mother-in-law, Adrienne {Cuvellier} Vigne, a woman we will meet in due course but whose reputed actions should be related in this context. (Adrienne was actually Adrienne Damen at this time, having married another member of the Twelve, Jan Damen, sometime during the 1630s.) In one successful Dutch raid on the Canarsie Indians, numerous prisoners were taken and the heads of other Indians were brought back to New Amsterdam displayed on poles as trophies. As the prisoners and the poles were coming into the town, many of the women abused the captives. Adrienne gained her notoriety by (it is said) kicking around heads that had fallen off the poles, much as one would a soccer ball. This story, firmly implanted in the folklore of New York City, continues to be repeated in contemporary scholarly histories of the city – although Adrienne's identity as the kicker is not always given in these accounts.

After hostilities had died down (and the West India Company had begun to show an interest in investigating the matter), Kieft's enemies tried to blame him for the conflict and Kieft tried to make scapegoats out of the signers of the petition. Abraham Verplanck was one of three men whom, on the advice of an investigating group, the Company summoned back to the Netherlands for "examination," but it does not appear that he actually returned.²² Historians differ as to whether Kieft or the others should bear the brunt of the responsibility for this unsavory incident. Some of Abraham's contemporaries did lay a share of the blame on him, and it seems clear that he was at least an instigator and perhaps worse. On the other hand, we should not lose sight of the fact that through his participation in these events Abraham Verplanck played a role in a key turning point in New Netherland's history: his membership among the Twelve, whatever we may think of his views toward the Indians, is in itself significant because that group is regarded as having laid the foundation for popular government in the colony. In addition, the incident helped to undermine the Company's confidence in Kieft so that it replaced him with a far more significant figure, Petrus Stuyvesant.

The name of Abraham Verplanck's father, we know from the younger man's patronymic, was ISAACSE VERPLANCK. We do not know the name of Abraham's mother, but there are hints that it might have been Abigail (the name of the first daughter of Abraham and Maria). Isaacse, born about 1580 perhaps, may have immigrated to New Netherland, but there is no record of his having done so. A woman named Abigail Verplanck did come to New Netherland during the mid-1600s, but we do not know her age and cannot be sure that she was related to Abraham.

It seems quite possible that Isaacse was the relative – perhaps the nephew – of Jacob Albertsen Planck of Edam in North Holland, the Netherlands, whom the patroon Kiliaen van Rensselaer had hired in 1634 for a three-year term as his representative and agent in Rensselaerswyck. Planck and the patroon made their agreement in March of 1634 and Planck arrived on the Eendracht (Unity) during the summer of that year. Since Abraham is known to have arrived in New Amsterdam about then, it is possible he sailed aboard the same ship. We do know that Jacob Planck co-signed a note for Abraham Verplanck's purchase of the former Pauw land in 1638, which argues for some sort of family relationship. Perhaps young Abraham (a younger son without many prospects in the Netherlands?) was sent over with his uncle Jacob, who had brought along his own son named Abraham, but we have no solid evidence that Jacob Planck and Abraham Verplanck were related.²³ If they were, we are probably right in thinking that Abraham too was from Edam and that the name of his grandfather, Isaacse's father, was Albert Verplanck.

In addition, there are scattered references to Verplancks in the Netherlands that offer some possible clues about the origins of the Abraham Isaacse Verplanck we have been considering. Many of these Verplancks were from the southern part of the country, perhaps even from what is now Belgium, and at least one was a Huguenot. That one of them served in the Dutch fleet with a relative of Kiliaen van Rensselaer hints at how the patroon might have decided to hire Jacob Albertsen Planck as his representative in New Netherland. All of this must be considered pure conjecture, as we know nothing definite about the Verplancks in the Netherlands.

We take up now the Vigne²⁴ family of Abraham's wife, Maria. As we have seen, she was born in France about 1608 to 1610 and died in Albany in 1670 or 1671. Maria's younger siblings were baptized in the French Reformed Church in Leyden (now Leiden), the Netherlands, between 1618 and 1623, and it is possible that she was also baptized there. She came to New Netherland with her parents – which year she arrived is an issue that will be considered shortly – and married a man named Jan Roos, probably about 1631. They had one child before Roos died the next year. (From this one child, incidentally, both Theodore and Franklin D. Roosevelt are descended, so those presidents and I have a common ancestor.)

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Maria's parents were GUILLAUME VIGNE and ADRIENNE A. {CUVELLIER} VIGNE, each of whom was born sometime between 1580 and 1590. Guillaume, whose name was customarily rendered as Guleyn in Dutch, is thought by one researcher also to have been born in St. Waast-la-Haute, Valenciennes, France, in 1586 to a family that may have come from nearby Cambrai. Although Guillaume and Adrienne were married in France in 1608, they were in actuality Walloons – a Calvinist Gallic-Teutonic, French-speaking group that lived on both sides of the present border area between France and Belgium, since Valenciennes was heavily Walloon in composition.²⁵ Many of the "French" immigrants to New Amsterdam were actually Walloon Calvinists, although others came to the Dutch outpost from northern France.

Valenciennes (previously in both the Netherlands and Belgium but now in northeast France, near the Belgian border) was in the southern portion of the Spanish-controlled Walloon provinces of the Netherlands. When Philip II of Spain ascended to the throne in 1556, he began to take action against what he saw as religious heresy in the Low Countries, which as we have seen began to attract those, like the Walloons, who were seeking asylum from religious persecution. Valenciennes had in fact been the first Dutch city to offer resistance to the Spanish rulers of the Netherlands, in 1567, and it had suffered severe destruction as a result. Many of its inhabitants had taken refuge elsewhere; others, apparently including members of the Vigne and Cuvellier families, fell victim to Spanish repression.

The twelve-year truce between the Spanish and the Dutch rebels neared an end in 1621. As it came to a close, some Walloons and French who were living temporarily in England decided that immigration to America would be preferable to returning to their home territory, since it was likely to be the scene of renewed fighting between the Spanish and the Dutch. They asked the English to let them go to Virginia, then persuaded the new West India Company to permit them to immigrate to New Amsterdam instead. The Vignes were living in the tolerant and safe city of Leyden by early 1623, for their youngest daughter was baptized there on March 16 of that year. We do not know if they were among those who lived briefly in England, but we are fairly sure that they were part of the body of Walloons who departed for New Netherland at this time.

One Vigne researcher has identified a Cuvellier woman who was married to a Dutch merchant instrumental in the Van Tweenhuysen Company that sent to North America the very first Dutch trading expedition, headed by Captain Adriaen Block, and so it is possible the Vignes had learned about the opportunities for settlement through a family connection. As a group the Walloons were drawn not only by the prospect of freedom of worship but also by promises of livestock and land ownership after they had worked six years for the West India Company. About thirty Walloon families, well over 100 persons in all, volunteered to be among those immigrating to New Netherland.

After formally swearing allegiance to the Dutch West Indies Company and to the Dutch government, an advance party of Walloons and others sailed on the Eendracht on January 25, 1624; its captain was Cornelius May (after whom Cape May is named). When the ship arrived in what is New York Harbor it had to drive off a French vessel that was there to claim the area for France. The main body of Walloons followed two months later aboard the Nieuw Nederlandt (New Netherland). We do not know which group included the Vignes, presuming that they were among the Walloons who came to New Netherland at this time. Some of the Walloons were deposited on what is now Governor's Island, just off Manhattan Island; others were placed in locations in what is today New Jersey and Connecticut, on an island in the Delaware River, and at Fort Orange (already ten years old in 1624) nearly one hundred miles up the Hudson River. This dispersion of families was in keeping with the Dutch concept of claiming land by having persons actually inhabit it – the land, in this case, being the area adjoining the three key rivers that the Dutch intended to control: the Fresh (Connecticut), North (Hudson), and South (Delaware) Rivers.²⁶

We do not know whether the Vigne family lived for a brief time in one of these other locations or remained in what would become New York City the entire time, but since most of the couples were sent someplace other than Manhattan it seems possible the Vignes began their lives in New Netherland at one of the outposts.²⁷ Within a few years, between 1626 and 1628, hostile Indians had led to a Dutch decision to consolidate all of these weak and scattered settlements on Manhattan Island, which as we have seen Peter Minuit "purchased" from the local Indian tribes. Discouraged, more than half of the Walloons had by now returned to Europe, but the Vigne family stayed. They are the first of my ancestors to have come to America.

An old tradition is worth recounting here. This tradition holds that the Vignes were living in what would soon become New Amsterdam by 1614, even before Manhattan Island began to be settled. Indeed, they are sometimes credited – by a plaque at City Hall in New York City, for instance – with being the parents of the first child of European origins born in Manhattan, in 1614: their son Jan Vigne (Maria's younger brother), whom we have already met. Some of the speculation has the Vignes traveling with Captain Block, who after his ship burned wintered on Manhattan Island during 1613-1614.²⁸ According to this story, Guillaume Vigne was an early trader for the United New Netherland Company and had his family with him during his stays on Manhattan Island. Recent research, though, has unearthed the fact that several Vigne children were baptized in Leyden between 1618 and 1622, and so the weight of evidence supports 1624 for the family's arrival in New Amsterdam.²⁹

Moreover, the date of 1614 for Jan Vigne's birth depends on a casual estimate of his age (as "about sixty-five") many years later, and the estimate itself may in fact have been written as "fifty-five." Jan Vigne seems to have been in school, and so a minor, even as late as 1635, which also argues for considering 1624 as the year of his birth. (Although it is true that his contemporaries often regarded Jan as the first European child born on the island, this could have been so even if the Vigne family arrived in 1624; the point at issue is which year they arrived.)

Whatever year the Vignes arrived, and whether or not Guillaume was once a trader, we know that once they were definitely residing on Manhattan Island he was engaged primarily in agriculture. He was in fact the first tenant on the six farms north of what would be Wall Street (near Pearl Street) that the West India Company owned, laid out, and rented in its effort to produce foodstuffs for its soldiers and employees in New Amsterdam.³⁰ In time he like so many others undoubtedly took up the production of tobacco. But Guillaume did not live for long: he died in New Amsterdam no later than April 30, 1632, when his will was recorded.

A few years later, Adrienne married a man named Jan Jansen Damen, a prominent and relatively wealthy resident of New Amsterdam; Maria, already married herself by this time, is listed as one of the four children of Guillaume and Adrienne. The Damen-Vigne marriage, which took place as early as 1635 but no later than May 7, 1638, brought together two families that owned a large share of the property of the young town.³¹ Damen was well-connected – he too was a member of the Twelve – and the churchwarden. The combined property (known as the Kolk Hook farm), just outside the city wall, was largely on the east side of Broadway (near present-day Maiden Lane, Pine Street, and William Street) but also ran westward to what was then the shore of the Hudson (North) River – very near to where the World Trade Center would later be built upon landfill. The Damen farmhouse was on Broadway near Cedar Street, and Adrienne seems to have kept a smaller house about where 112 Broadway is today.³²

The court minutes record some of the details of an embarrassing public spectacle, a disagreement of some sort between Damen and his new wife's family – including son-in-law Abraham Verplanck. Damen filed suit to throw these relatives out of his house. There was a countersuit, but eventually harmony was restored. Damen died as early as 1651 and certainly by 1653, when the court minutes refer to Adrienne as his widow.

Adrienne herself died in 1655, almost certainly in New Amsterdam. Unfortunately, we do not know anything about her Cuvellier family, except that it was originally probably French.³³ As for the Vigne line, we know only that Guillaume's father was named JEAN DE LA VIGNE. One research describes Jean as the Walloon dominie (minister) in Amsterdam from 1585 until his death in 1622, but I have not been able to confirm that this man was the Jean de la Vigne who was Guillaume's father. This Jean who served as dominie was born about 1560 in Valenciennes, France, and so a link does seem plausible.

There are grounds for doubting such a link, however. We can presume that Jean de la Vigne had fled France at some point during the 1580s for the haven of the Netherlands. If Maria Vigne was born in France about 1608-1610, however, we can date the immigration of her parents Guillaume and Adrienne to the Netherlands much later – between then and the early 1620s. In addition, one source suggests that Guillaume and Adrienne joined Leyden's Walloon church in October 1619, which makes one wonder why they would flee there rather than to Amsterdam if Jean was the dominie in Amsterdam. In the end, without more evidence we cannot be positive that Guillaume was related to the Jean de la Vigne who went to Amsterdam during the 1580s.³⁴

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We return for a final time to the long (and well-documented) Vanderpool line, having completed our look at these two interesting families with which it intermarried. The parents of Melgert van de Poel were WYNANT GERRITSE VAN DER POEL³⁵ and TRIJNTJE TRYNTJE MELGERS {ROCHOLTE}³⁶ VAN DER POEL. Wynant is said in the Vanderpool family histories to have been born in the Netherlands in 1620 and to have immigrated to Fort Orange/Rensselaerswyck around 1644 to 1647, but more recent information indicates that his date of birth was 1617 and that he was still in Amsterdam as late as 1652.³⁷

Trijntje was born in 1619. We know the names of her parents: MELCHIOR ROCHOLTE and NEELTIE CORNELIS ROCHOLTE, but we do not know the latter's family name. In fact, we know very little more about either of the two, except that they were presumably married by 1603 because they had a son born the next year. Melchior was possibly a knife-maker, since his son also practiced this trade. Melchior and Neeltie were living in Korsjessteeg in Amsterdam as of 1624.³⁸

On October 21, 1640, Wynant and Trijntje were married in Sloterdijk, a small village then near (and now part of) Amsterdam.³⁹ At that time, they lived on a street named Langestraat,⁴⁰ and they seem to have continued living there in later years. Seven children from this marriage were baptized in Amsterdam between 1641 and 1652; at least three of them died young and were buried from the New Church. Melgert, as we have seen the second boy to bear that name, was the oldest surviving child.

Sometime between December of 1652 and May of 1654, when Wynant van der Poel is first mentioned in Fort Orange, he and his family departed for New Netherland. Wynant may have been sponsored by a brother or other relative who worked for the West India Company.⁴¹ The arrival of the Van der Poels reflects the more vigorous recruiting of families that the West India Company was engaged in at mid-century, as the company realized the economic potential of its New Netherland outpost (which had just gained the right to have a municipal government). In addition, adventurous young Dutchmen eager to get ahead were drawn to New Netherland, especially as publicity about New Amsterdam's agitation for self-government in 1649 and after brought the opportunities in the colony as a whole to their attention. Wynant van der Poel apparently was among those who decided to cast his lot with New Netherland.

For the van der Poels, we are in the unusual position of knowing some details about the life and work of the female head of the family. In Fort Orange, Trijntje van der Poel was employed at least from 1656 onwards as an officially appointed vroedvrouw, meaning "midwife" – a profession that had considerable visibility and prestige in New Netherland as it did in the Netherlands itself. Midwives were required to take an oath promising good behavior, conscientious care, and fair fees. She died in Albany on August 17 1674.⁴²

That first reference to Wynant, on May 12, 1654, was his being fined for not having built a structure on his lot (an indication that he was trading for furs without having fulfilled his promise to build the house – the "hearth and light" – that would legitimize this activity) and for fighting. He continues to appear in the documentary record, which shows that he was not only a sawyer but also a "master cabinetmaker," although like most of the Dutch newcomers he undoubtedly was as active as he could be in the fur trade with the Indians.⁴³ Indeed, we know that Wynant van der Poel carried on active business relationships with firms in Amsterdam.

The record describes numerous commercial and property disagreements in which Wynant was involved, mostly indebtedness and violations of contracts, but other disputes erupted over the damage that Wynant's hogs had done to a neighbor's oat sheaves, his drinking of another man's wine without permission, his failure to pave his sidewalk, his possession of more land than his patent specified, his defamation of someone's character (he accused a woman of being a chicken thief), and his not furnishing a deed for a lot that he had sold. In some of these instances Wynant was described as having used abusive language or even threats (of murder in one case), and there were several physical altercations as well. In one notorious incident, the colony's secretary – evidently inebriated – railed at van der Poel, said that he "would have the old fool hanged as the mill is done," and insulted Wynant's wife as a "big slut" with fat legs. In another incident, Wynant van der Poel struck a wheelwright with one of his wheel spokes after arguing with the man.

Here, then, is another contentious – and probably hard-drinking – Dutchman (although litigation over seemingly trivial matters does seem to have been something of an indoor sport in New Netherland). Even Wynant's wife Trijntje got into trouble on more than one occasion and in one instance was assaulted by another resident, who defended herself by saying that Trijntje had struck first.

Wynant appears to have owned several houses, lots, and farmland that he rented out. His own residences in Albany were at 12 North Pearl Street, which he purchased in 1670, and at 10 James Street. In 1669 and 1679 he is also shown owning two lots on Chapel Street, just north of State Street, and in the latter year his son Melgert is shown living there as well. All of these properties were in the heart of downtown Albany, as it was now called.⁴⁴ Although van der Poel, like so many other Dutch residents of New Netherland, apparently never learned to read the language the new English administrators and soldiers brought with them after 1664, in time he became one of the most prosperous of Albany's residents: of 143 householders who were taxed to contribute to a new palisaded fence in 1679, only 8 were charged more than Wynant and only 3 others paid the amount he did. (His son Melgert was, not surprisingly, taxed considerably less.) And yet, in keeping with the modest nature of the houses of traders in Albany, Wynant's house was thought to be small because he could not get a keg in the front door.⁴⁵

Whatever his other activities, Wynant van der Poel is, like Albert Bradt, remembered for being a sawyer. He evidently owned more than one sawmill, but the one for which he is best known was located on the east bank of the Hudson River in what is now the southern part of the city of Troy, New York.⁴⁶ He may not have been the first owner of this sawmill, for the creek on which it stood had been acquired from the Indians on January 27, 1651. His ownership of the mill, however, led to the creek's taking his name: by the later 1600s it had become known as Wynantskill, the name it continues to bear today.⁴⁷

Wynant's partner at this sawmill until 1660 was Abraham Vosburgh. After his partner's death that year, Wynant engaged in a long-running legal dispute with Vosburgh's widow, Geertruyt Pieterse {Coeymans} Vosburgh, over their conflicting interests. As we have seen, Geertruyt was Albert Bradt's third wife; indeed, the two were married and then separated during the period – more than ten years – that her dispute with Wynant van der Poel was in the courts. The dispute was finally settled in October 1674 when Wynant purchased Vosburgh's half of the sawmill and a dwelling at the site.⁴⁸ In 1685, Wynant seems to have sold a half-share in this sawmill and to have given the other half to his son Gerrit. Wynant van der Poel and Albert Bradt thus were not only competitors for a dozen years or so but both had the distinction of giving their names to the tributaries on which their respective sawmills were located.

Wynant lived in Albany until 1694 but evidently died in New York City in 1695, possibly in the midst of what he intended to be a last visit to that city. His will (his second) that is dated that year states, however, that his residence is in New York City. Since the will was written on February 29, 1695, and proved on April 17, 1702, we can be sure only that he died between those dates. If he died in 1702, it is possible that he was among New York City's victims of a yellow fever epidemic, which killed about one out of every ten residents.⁴⁹ The Vanderpool family in New York City belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church on Exchange Place, and Wynant was probably buried there.⁵⁰

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Wynant Gerritse van der Poel's parents were GERRIT VAN DER POEL and CORNELIA {WYNANT} VAN DER POEL,⁵¹ who were married in 1613. We know nothing about the Wynant line, but the name does sound Dutch. It is through Cornelia, therefore, that the given name of Wynant – still used today by Vanderpools in naming their children – first entered the Vanderpool family. Gerrit, who was born about 1590, is said in the Vanderpool family histories to have been a raiser of sheep or a cloth manufacturer in Gorchum (Goringen), a city at the junction of the Maas River and the Linge River in the Netherlands.

Information from the Dutch Genealogical Bureau, though, indicates that Gerrit was actually from Meppel in the province of Drenthe. He fled to Amsterdam between 1600 and 1609 in order to escape persecution for his religious beliefs and then may have immigrated sometime during the 1620s to the new Dutch outpost in the New World.⁵²

A profile of the family that the Bureau provided to me speculates that Gerrit might have been the Gerrit Lambers van der Poel from Meppel who married a woman named Trijne and who lived in the Weldemansstraet near "the pool" (in this case, meaning dyke), which would account for the eventual family name.⁵³ (If this speculation is correct, Trijne would have been an early wife of the Gerrit who married Cornelia Wynant.) This is as far as the trail takes us, or maybe farther, although the Vanderpool family historian cited earlier states that a Jon van der Poel is listed as owning 100 acres and five farms in the Netherlands as early as 1240. Others trace the family back to William IV, Count of Hainaut, Holland, and Zeeland (1304-1345), through William's second son. The European origins of the Vanderpool line are sufficiently vague that we should place little confidence in such information.

Thus the Vanderpool line extends back a full nine generations from my grandmother, Glenn Vanderpool: through Samuel Green Vanderpool, James Vanderpool, John M. Vanderpool, Abraham Vanderpool, his father Abraham Vanderpool, Wynant van der Poel, Melgert van der Poel, Wynant van der Poel, and Gerrit van der Poel. As we have pushed our search steadily back in time, we have also encountered such interesting families as de Hooges, Post, Verplanck, and Vigne.

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rev. 2/15/06

Notes

¹Sometimes this name is spelled Melchert.

²By coincidence, the parents of both Wynant and Catharina were married on the same date in different years.

³Both churches still exist. As we have seen, the Old Church also figures in the Bradt portion of the family history (see above). The New Church (Nieuw Kerk in Dutch), technically called St. Catherine's, dates from the 17th century. Still usually called the New Church, it is on the Dam next to City Hall (now the Royal Palace). It is here that the Dutch monarchs are crowned. See slide 05106, taken in 1991. Return to text

⁴Fort Albany was located near the present St. Peter's Church, about two-thirds of the way up what is now State Street. See slide 08779 for a general view of this area in 1997. Van der Poel's house would have been below Lodge Street, across from the modern hotel building. One source, however, places it on the north side of State Street instead, at the corner of Pearl Street.

⁵Presumably this is the lot mentioned later in this section and shown in slide 11631, taken in 2005. Return to text

⁶Bradt's contribution to this cause seems a bit odd in view of the fact that he was not only a practicing Lutheran but someone who had run afoul of the Dutch Reformed orthodoxy. Return to text

⁷The father was Lourens van Alen, and the daughter was Catharina {van Alen} van der Poel. The Vanderpool portion of the lands ran along the river east to Pine Ridge (the present Ridge Road) and Kalkoenberg ("Turkey Hill"). The name Poelsburg was given to this area, but this name is no longer in use. We do not know for sure that Melgert actually lived in Kinderhook. Some of the Vanderpools from this branch of the family were Loyalists during the American Revolution, and one of them, Isaac Vanderpoel (as he spelled the name) even commanded a company of pro-British refugees on Staten Island. The home of one of the Vanderpools from this branch of the family is prominently featured in Kinderhook. See slide 08821 (1997) for the site of the old Dutch church in Kinderhook, where some members of the family likely worshipped, were married, or were buried from. It is possible that Melgert was among them. Return to text

⁸His biography in Genealogies of the First Settlers of Albany, however, states that Melgert was deceased by 1700.

⁹Melgert had at least two children (in 1693 and 1695) with his second wife, who died in 1720. Born in 1652, Elizabeth was the daughter of a merchant named William Teller and his first wife, Margaret {Donchesen} Teller, who died before 1664. Teller later married a widow, Marie {Varlett} Teller. Elizabeth's first husband was Abraham van Tricht. Return to text

¹⁰This name was usually spelled Verplanck (in the court records of New Amsterdam, for instance) but became Ver Planck later on before finally reverting to Verplanck in the 19th century. The prefix ver is a Dutch abbreviation for vander, meaning "of" or "from the." In Dutch, the name means "of the plank." Abraham Verplanck often spelled his name Planck when he was younger, though, and another Verplanck in New Netherland, the patroon's agent Jacob Planck (possibly Abraham's uncle), always did. I have used Verplanck, except for Jacob. In the Netherlands, the name may have originally been Ver Plancken. The author of a family history featuring Abraham Verplanck mentions a French family with a similar name, but there is no evidence linking Abraham to it.

¹¹Maria's first husband, as we shall see, died in 1632, so 1634 is a prudent estimate for the marriage. The Verplanck-Vigne marriage shows how the diverse ethnic groups on Manhattan Island (one Dutch and the other French or Belgian) began at once to intermarry. One of the other daughters of Abraham and Maria, incidentally, was an ancestor of Thomas Alva Edison.

¹²The court minutes of New Amsterdam, in their last reference (1672) to either Abraham or Maria, note that she left a will dated August 9, 1670. The index to the volume implies that Abraham was also dead, but although the wording of the document itself uses the phrase "late wife Maria" it does not call Abraham "the late Abraham," so I think he is still alive when the minutes were written. Moreover, these minutes do seem to refer to him in 1674. The court minutes cease soon afterwards, so it is not possible to find a reference to his death in them. There is also circumstantial evidence supporting 1671 as the approximate date of Maria's death: Maria was one of the principal heirs of the estate of her stepfather, Jan Damen, and this estate was broken up in 1671. When the Damen estate was partitioned, Abraham Verplanck became the owner of about one-quarter of it (along Wall Street) but sold his interests within a few years. Return to text

¹³The center of Pavonia was about where Henderson Street and Fifth Street meet in today's Jersey City, New Jersey. See the USGS map for Jersey City/New Jersey. See slide 09690 for a view of this area in 2000. Return to text

¹⁴See slides 08833, 08834, and 008836 for views in 1997 of the approximate site of the Dutch fort, which is now covered by the massive U.S. Customs House.

¹⁵Abraham Verplanck's property on Bridge Street is approximately equivalent to 25 Pearl Street, which runs parallel to Bridge Street here. See slides 08424-08425, 08427, 08432, 08433 (all taken in 1996), and 08835 (taken in 1997). His property was the site of or near to the residences of some famous later New Yorkers, including Mayor Cornelius Steenwyck and the Morris family. On September 21, 1776, the day British forces took control of New York City after General Washington and his troops evacuated the city, the Bridge Street area was engulfed in one of New York City's great fires. An office building constructed in 1961 is now on this site. Although some of the old Dutch streets were shifted, even as early as the 17th century but more particularly by the extensive construction in this area during the 20th century as newer and taller buildings and new roadways (to say nothing of subways) were built, in fact the layout of the area is remarkably similar to what it was three or four centuries ago: the streets show clearly their 17th-century origins and connections. See the maps of the area that I found in two histories of New Amsterdam; these maps show the actual sites of the Verplanck properties and can be matched up with our contemporary maps of the area. Return to text

¹⁶The ferry to Brooklyn already landed at the foot of Fulton Street and would continue to do so until the Brooklyn Bridge was built nearby.

¹⁷See slides 08437, 08438, and 08443 (taken in 1996). In 1665 Verplanck and his brother-in-law, Jan Vigne, were listed in the court minutes as living in Smith's Valley, an area of somewhat lower-lying land that extended along Pearl Street northward from about the location of Maiden Lane – in other words, about where Fulton Street is now. There is quite an irony here, in light of the fact that I did my Ph.D. dissertation on Alfred E. Smith, whose association with Fulton Street and its fish market was legendary. Indeed, Smith lived in places throughout the area just adjacent to the Verplanck property at Pearl and Fulton, and as a boy he had a paper route that covered a large portion of this area. (Smith's Valley was of course not named for Al Smith. Nor was he named for it, although Smith was not his family's original name but one it acquired when it came to America.) Return to text

¹⁸In one dispute, Verplanck's case was undercut when his opponent got Director Stuyvesant to intervene on his behalf. Return to text

¹⁹A Juriaen Planck, a trader, is mentioned in the accounts of this affair; it is possible that he and Abraham were related, but we do not know more about him. See the USGS map for Philadelphia/Pennsylvania for the location of Verplanck's grant. Return to text

²⁰Jan Vigne was one of the relatively few (nineteen persons) who became a Great Burgher.

²¹Guleyn, a merchant, had a store on Pearl Street between Broad Street and Whitehall Street and a residence on Wall Street near what became Federal Hall. (See slide 08829 taken in 1997.) Later, he and partners got a patent for a large part of what is now Dutchess County, near Fishkill, where he built a manor house that was destroyed by shells from a British ship during the Revolutionary War. Guleyn was a principal in what may have been the first instance of court-ordered child support in New York, and perhaps the country. Through their land, and the families into which they married, the Verplancks, many of whom were merchants, became known as a wealthy Hudson River family. They probably owned slaves, as most of these families did. The Verplancks also gave their name to a point along the Hudson River shoreline and to a town across from Stony Point. Another Verplanck residence (the home of Gulian Verplanck, a prominent Tory), was where the Society of Cincinnati was formed in 1783. Gulian Verplanck (1786-1870) was probably the most well-known member of this family. Like several others he was active in politics, and he was a member of Congress. In 1834, he was defeated (by only 180 votes out of 35,000 cast) as the Whig candidate for mayor of New York City. He was also a prominent writer on public affairs, literature, law, and other topics and was described in a recent history of the city as the "spokesman" for the Dutch in New York. There is a Verplanck Room at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City that contains furnishings and paintings from the Verplanck house at 3 Wall Street dating from the time of Samuel Verplanck in the 18th century. These items are contained within a non-Verplanck house of comparable date. One of Abraham Verplanck's grandsons, incidentally, married a Van der Poel. Return to text

²²Kieft was soon recalled but died at sea returning to the Netherlands. Return to text

²³Jacob Planck's term was not renewed (van Rensselaer regarded him, like all the men he sent to his colony, as deficient in submitting reports and accounts), and Planck went back to the Netherlands in 1638 or 1639. He settled his accounts with Van Rensselaer by 1643, but evidently he returned to New Amsterdam because the court minutes refer to a man named Jacob Albertsen Verplanck who was deceased by 1656. This makes him plausibly a contemporary of (and so possibly a brother to) Abraham's father, Isaacse. Return to text

²⁴Some sources spell the name Vingre, and some researchers believe that the name – however spelled – may have meant "vine" in French. The line died out after Maria's only brother, Jan, left no male issue. Return to text

²⁵Other Walloons came from Hainault, Namur, Liege, and Luxembourg. Return to text

²⁶The Walloon settlement on the Delaware River was on an island then called High Island and now called Burlington Island, which is about halfway between Trenton and Philadelphia. Return to text

²⁷One book on Huguenot immigrants to America states that the Vignes arrived in New Amsterdam from French Flanders in 1624, which suggests that they did not live anywhere else where the Walloons were planted before settling in New Amsterdam. Return to text

²⁸It is he who gave his name to Block Island.

²⁹One researcher contends that the family arrived on board The Tiger. Return to text

³⁰See slide 08826 for the site of the Vigne farm as of 1997. Return to text

³¹It was from Damen that Abraham Verplanck bought his property at Pearl Street and Fulton Street, in an area known as The Ferry.

³²Later, the Equitable Building was constructed on the site of Damen's farmhouse. (See slide 08827, taken in 1997.) The 1660 Castello plan of New Amsterdam shows Damen's larger house and the smaller one owned by Adrienne. The site of her house is not just a matter for curiosity, for it is likely that in accordance with custom she – and perhaps also Guillaume – was buried in a family plot near the house. (See slide 08828, also taken in 1997, for the site of Adrienne's house.) In 1658 her daughter Maria was among Adrienne's heirs who were sued by the elder of the church for failing to pay for her grave. This entire area was also in the zone affected by the great fire of September 21, 1776. Return to text

³³According to some researchers, the name may indicate that members of the family originally were makers of small casks – were coopers, in other words. On the other hand, one researcher has pointed out that "Jean de la Vigne" or "Jean des Vignes" was often used as a pseudonym or euphemism in France at that time – for example, as the name of the puppet for whom jugglers "performed," as a fool or stupid person, or as a drunk. It seems possible that Guillaume's father chose this somewhat whimsical name as an alias when he was the target of religious persecution and that the name stuck, but this is only speculative on my part. Return to text

³⁴As a later section will explain in more detail, there was intense hostility to religious dissent and what we came to call Protestantism in France until the Edict of Nantes of 1598, which allowed Protestants in France (most notably the ones called Huguenots) some freedoms. The Edict of Nantes was not actually revoked until 1685, but Huguenots were sometimes persecuted – and never felt secure – in France even between 1598 and 1685. Jean de la Vigne's departure for the Netherlands reflected this feeling. Return to text

³⁵Sometimes spelled Poell.

³⁶This name is sometimes spelled Rocholt or Rocholts. On the marriage register it is spelled Roocholte.

³⁷Thus the information contributed to the LDS that he was born in Fort Orange or Kinderhook in 1628 or 1629, and that he was married in New Amsterdam on October 1, 1640, must not be correct. Other information also contributed to the LDS gives the year 1650 as the date of his marriage but places that marriage in Fort Orange/Rensselaerswyck. Return to text

³⁸This may be the street called Korsjespoortsteeg today, which runs between the canals called Herengracht and Singel. It is in what was in the 1600s the far northwest corner of Amsterdam. Return to text

³⁹Sloterdijk was a separate community west of the old city of Amsterdam, on the canal to Haarlem. It has been a part of Amsterdam since 1921 but is said to retain the feel of the small village it once was.

⁴⁰This street runs parallel to Herengracht and Singel, and so crosses Korsjespoortsteeg. Return to text

⁴¹Some researchers believe that Wynant's older brother, Teunis, also came to New Netherland. The man thought to be Wynant's brother later took Spitzbergen as his family name. Return to text

⁴²When the governor appointed Trijntje as a midwife in 1670, the record noted that she had been practicing her trade for fourteen years. Return to text

⁴³It is possible that Wynant actually made kisten, elaborately carved trunks in which Dutch families packed away their valuable belongings, for this is the term that is usually translated as "cabinet." Men with Wynant's skills often made gun stocks as well, which may explain why his son, Melgert, took up this craft. Return to text

⁴⁴The first of these properties was on the west side of Pearl Street and extended nearly as far as Chapel Street, between Steuben Street and Maiden Lane. Because of the rearrangement of streets in later years, the present location seems to be about where Pine Street intersects Pearl Street. See slide 11639, taken in 2005, for this location. The second property, on James Street, extended between that street and Broadway just north of Maiden Lane. Here again the later Pine Street may cover the site of Wynant Vanderpool's property. See slide 11635, also taken in 2005, for the approximate location. The third property, which ran most of the way toward Pearl Street, is now the site of a modern hotel building – in which I stayed long before I knew where the Vanderpools had lived in Albany. See slide 11631, taken in 2005, for a view of the location of the two lots on Chapel Street. See the various maps of Albany in my files for information about the locations of all these properties.

⁴⁵One case in which Wynant was involved, in 1682, is notable because an Englishman accused of encroaching on Wynant's land defended himself by challenging the casual Dutch customs by which land ownership was documented. Return to text

⁴⁶One of Wynant's other sawmills, near the Green Bos (a wooded area now part of the city of Rensselaer), burned in March 1678. Predictably, Wynant and his partner engaged in a long-running dispute over who owed whom what after the fire.

⁴⁷Wynantskill twists and turns from above the community known as Wynantskill (considerably upstream) down to its exit into the Hudson River in the southern part of Troy. As with Bradt's mill, the exact location can only be estimated through exploration with a topographical map. This process led me to conclude that the location was about where Mill Street (U.S. 4) divides after dropping down a substantial hill, although a higher location below Burdens Pond is also a possibility. See the USGS map for Troy South/New York, along with another map in my files and slides 08811-08814, taken in 1997. Return to text

⁴⁸Wynant seems to have lived in Albany, though, not at the site of this dwelling. Return to text

⁴⁹Another source says Wynant died in 1699. His will gave his estate to his son-in-law, other than a trifling amount (six shillings) left to his son, Melgert. Some researchers speculate that Wynant was punishing Melgert; others believe that Melgert had already received his share of the inheritance, or that his own wealth (from his wife) made a share unnecessary.

⁵⁰The church was between Broad Street and William Street. See slides 08830 and 08831 for 1997 views of the approximate location. Return to text

⁵¹One Vanderpool family historian gives her name as Weyntie Wolters. Return to text

⁵²If this is so, he might have arrived even earlier than the Vignes – and so would become the first of my ancestors to have come to America. Return to text

⁵³If so, Trijne would have to have been an earlier wife of Gerrit than Cornelia. Return to text

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