Pieter Stoutenburg the Man

Every family has stories about its ancestors. One side of my family is no exception to this. Several of my ancestors were in North America at the earliest part of the European settlement. Today, I am writing a post on my blog about just one of the family stories.

The story is that rich Pieter Stoutenburg was the first treasurer of New Amsterdam or the treasurer of the Dutch Colony. Other stories exist that he was treasurer when the British took control of New Amsterdam and that he had done such a good job that the British authorities retained him as treasurer.

I found this story repeated in books written in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Many of these books were written on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of a county, state or community and often included genealogies of the pioneer families. Then I found the same language repeated in genealogical and biographical magazines. Now, it's repeated in family trees posted on the Internet.

There is often some element of truth in most family legends. It's like the game of telephone. Each time the story is repeated it has little changes. The Pieter Stoutenburg story is no exception. Pieter Stoutenburg did at one time serve as a treasurer.

Some history :

Pieter Stoutenburg was born in 1613 in the Netherlands, probably in Utrecht Province based on his surname as there is a Stoutenburg in that province. I have not found any record of his arrival in New Amsterdam but he was married in 1649 to Aefje van Tienhoven in New Amsterdam. Tienhoven is a town in Utrecht Province as well.

The records in which he is mentioned don't record his name as Pieter van Stoutenburg. That did surprise me as the only other person in New Netherland at the time that Pieter was there is Jacobus van Stoutenburg. Jacobus lived near current day Albany and eventually went back to the Netherlands.

 Now back to the story:

New Netherland was established more like a corporate holding than a colony. The Dutch West India Company appointed members and employees to management roles in New Netherland. It wasn’t until Pieter Stuyvesant arrived that the Company assigned a resident of New Amsterdam to serve as a local treasurer on the Company’s behalf. Wilhelmus Hendrickse Beekman held that position until the defeat of the Dutch colony in September of 1664.

The British established a colonial government in New York and appointed a mayor of New York City. The mayor appointed a city clerk who served the role of treasurer of the city. Thomas Willit was the first city clerk in New York City. He served from 1665 to 1668 when Cornelis Steenwyck was appointed. Cornelis occupied that position until 1671. Thomas Delavall and Matthias Nicoll also served as city clerk in 1671. John Lawrence was city clerk in 1672.

The Dutch briefly regained control the colony between 1673 and 1674. The function doesn’t seem to exist in 1673. Sometime in 1674, Johannes Van Bugh, as Burgomaster/Mayor, served as treasurer of City of New Orange/New York City. New Orange was the name that the Dutch then gave to the city in honor of the Dutch House of Orange. That name didn't last long and the British again called the city New York.

In 1676, the British established the position, “The Treasurer of the City.” Pieter Stoutenburg was the first to be appointed to that position. He was succeeded by Willem Bogardus in 1679. So this is probably where the story that he was the first treasurer of New Amsterdam arose.

Since Pieter Stoutenburg was in his early 60’s when he was appointed Treasurer of the City of New York, it hardly makes sense that he was the first treasurer of New Amsterdam let alone the treasurer of the colony.

So what about the rich Pieter Stoutenburg?

Pieter had small burghers rights. The wealthiest residents or people in the highest positions within the Company had great burghers rights. Property taxes were based on ranking of each property as 1^st class to 3^rd class. Owners of 1^st class property paying the most and those whose property is classified at 3^rd class paying the least. Pieter’s property on the various tax rolls was classified at 3^rd class.

 

Given the tax records, I am not sure that I would call him rich. However, he certainly was a man of means and standing within the community. He served as orphan master protecting orphan rights, as guardian to his sister-in-law’s orphans, as elder in the church, and other roles.

 

To me, he sounded like a person who cared about the well-being of children, his community and his civic involvement. Those mean more to me.

The General's Bouwerij

According to the record of baptisms at the Reformed Dutch Church of New Amsterdam, Wyntie, daughter of Pieter Stoutenburg and Aefje van Tienhonven, was baptized at the General's Bouwerij (farm) in 1662. The General was Peter Stuyvesant who was the Director-General in New Amsterdam on behalf of the Dutch West India Company. Stuyvesant had a house at the very end of lower Manhattan. Because I assumed that he had a bouwerij (bowery) attached to his home, I couldn't reconcile that fact the Wyntie was baptized at the General's Bouwerij and not at the church in the fort. The church in the fort was within walking distance of Peter Stuyvesant's home.

Fortunately I came across a magazine on the Internet, Americana. As I read it, I realized that Stuyvesant's Bouwerij was outside of the city wall. I also knew that Pieter Stoutenburg had a house and lot outside the city wall. Families that lived outside the wall were subject to attacks by aborigines. New Amsterdam afforded protection to its inhabitants against these attacks but not for those who lived outside the wall.

There apparently was some pressure by Thomas Hall and Wolfert Webber to provide protection to those who lived outside the wall. On May 3, 1660, the New Amsterdam council allowed a village to be established near Augustyn Heermans’ bouwerij and that of the Director-General. The village was established to provide a place in which the sparsely spaced inhabitants could go for protection from attack.

The village was established in the triangle formed by present day 3^rd Avenue, 4^th Avenue and St. Mark’s Place. The village included a blacksmith shop, a tavern and a schoolhouse. Stuyvesant erected a chapel on his bouwerij in which he solicited Domine Selyns to preach to the inhabitants on Sunday afternoons.

In addition to preaching on Sunday afternoons, Domine Selyns performed marriages and baptisms at Stuyveant’s bouwerij. He returned to the Netherlands in 1664 after the British took control. Although he returned to New York City in 1682 to be minister of the Reformed Dutch congregation, when he departed in 1664 his records were transferred to the church at the fort and copied into its baptismal record book.

The magazine also indicated that Pieter was an elder at the Stuyvesant Bouwerij congregation and that he and others joined the church at the fort after Selyns returned to Europe.

Source:
The Hamlet at the Bouwerij Part I by Hopper Striker Mott. Americana Volume 10, July 1915. Pages 660-676
New York City:The National Americana Society

George Norbury MacKenzie

 Who was George N. MacKenzie?

He was the editor of a series of books that was published in the early twentieth century on colonial families of the United States. These volumes contained genealogies of early families. Unfortunately, I found much of the information in these volumes to be full of errors. Most recently, I found a tree that referenced Everardus Bogardus and Anneke Jans.

Everardus Bogardus is called the first minister of the Dutch Reformed Church in New Amsterdam in Colonial Families of the United States of America, Volume I (George Norbury MacKenzie, Editor). This is not correct. In fact, the entire paragraph on Page 224 is full of errors. The paragraph reads:

"Dominie Everardus Bogardus, d. 1647; m. 21st June, 1642, Anneka Jans Roeloff; he was a native of Holland and the first minister of the Dutch Church at New Amsterdam; he obtained a grant of six acres on Manhattan Island, which afterwards became Trinity Church property; his wife Anneka Jans, was a granddaughter of Prince William of Orange, who afteward became King of Holland."

At the time that his book was compiled (1912), in the United States, the Netherlands was often called Holland, This is not really accurate as Holland could refer to one of two provinces, Noord Holland and Zuid Holland. Domine Bogardus was native of Utrecht Province.

Everardus was the second Reformed Dutch minister at New Amsterdam, not the first.

Bogardus did not marry Anneke Jans in 1642. The line in the book following the passage cited above states that Bogardus' son William married August 26, 1659. (See note below.) If Everardus and Anneke married in 1642, Willem would be about 16 or younger when he married.

Looking at the baptismal and marriage records in New Amsterdam in the 1600s, I find it highly unlikely that Willem Bogardus was married at such a young age. Males typically married in their early 20s.The baptismal records begin with the baptism of Jacob Wolpherttz's daughter, Neeltje on September 23, 1639. I found a record of the baptism of Cornelis Bogardus on October 9, 1640, of Jonas Bogardus on January 4, 1643, and of Pieter Bogardus on April 2, 1645.

Anneke Jans and Everardus Bogardus were clearly married before October 9, 1640. Willem Bogardus was their eldest child and was likely born before September, 1639, the date of the first entry in the Doop Book.The records of the city include an entry in which Anneke Jans, wife of Everardus Bogardus sold a hog on October 19, 1638.

It was In 1642 that Anneke Jans' daughter from her first marriage married Hans Kierstede. It was at the celebration of this marriage that Everardus Bogardus was able to garner enough pledges to be able to erect a permanent structure for his church.

The property mentioned in the paragraph did become the property of the Trinity Church in New York City and was the subject of legal battles beginning in the mid-eighteenth century and culminating in the early twentieth century. The descendants never prevailed in their several suits. The reasons are well documented.

Anneka is not the way that Anneke Jans' name was recorded. This is not the way this given name was spelled during this period. Anneke, Annetie, Annetje and Annetjen is the way this name was recorded. She was never Anneka Jans Roeloffs. That would have meant that she was the daughter of Roeloff. And that brings me to the last point.
Anneke Jans was the daughter of Jan. She was not "the granddaughter of Prince William of Orange, who afterward became King of Holland." Willem of Orange, also called Willem the Silent, died in 1584. He was instrumental in uniting the provinces, but he never was a king. Willem I, the first king of the Netherlands, was crowned in 1815.

It is important to keep the Williams straight. Willem the Silent's grandson, Willem, became William III, King of England in 1689. William III ruled jointly with his wife Mary Stuart.

Anneke Jans was the daughter of Tryn Jonas and Jan (patronym not known). She was born in Norway, not in the Netherlands. This story of her parentage appears to have been concocted sometime in the late nineteenth century.

Note: Willem Bogardus was married after October 29, 1659. This is the date on which the marriage banns were posted. "29 Aug. 1659. Willem Bogardus, Van N. Amsterdam, en Wyntje Sybrandts,Van O. Amsterdam."

"The Island at the Center of the World"

Each summer my husband and I make an annual trip to Lake Arrowhead, California to spend a week at Bruin Woods, UCLA Alumni Association Family Camp. Over the years, we have met a number of interesting people who are Alumni of UCLA. A few summers ago I met Simon Van Dijk. He is a professor of chemistry at Alamo Colleges in Texas and an immigrant from the Netherlands. (His wife is the UCLA alumna.)

Simon and I had a mutual interest (not chemistry). He is a Dutch immigrant to the United States; I am an American with a family history extending to the 17th century Netherlands. That first summer, we talked about Dutch history around the 16th and 17th century. Simon was then acutely aware of my family's history in Dutch New York.

The following summer, when we met again at Bruin Woods, Simon asked me if I had read a book entitled "The Island at the Center of the World." I had not, but Simon's discussion of the book intrigued me in part because of what he said about what he'd learned from reading the book. It fit with what I had learned from my research about the Dutch ethics of the time.

I returned home and bought the book to read. That which Mr. Shorto said in his book matched with the things I had found and added information to my knowledge base.

As I researched my family residing in North American in the 17th century, I realized that the Dutch colony in North America was the most ethnically diverse community in North America at that time. The other settlements in eastern North America were homogeneous and fairly exclusionary.

US history as taught in high school focuses on the arrival of the Puritans and purports that our country was shaped by the English. Even the AP American History class that it took in high school only briefly mentioned the Dutch settlement in what is now New York and New Jersey. Even as a student at the University of California at Berkeley, my US history course barely mentioned the Dutch Colony. Yet what I was learning about the Dutch colony and the Netherlands in the late 16th and early 17th centuries seemed to me had a greater impact on forming our country than did the British.

As I researched my family and realized that some of my roots stemmed from the Dutch, I began to study the Dutch colonization of New York. I found the 16th Century Dutch to generally be tolerant and fair to people of various religions and beliefs.

The English settlers, on the other hand, were less accepting of other ideas and beliefs. In fact, they persecuted the non-believers, driving them to the colonies of Connecticut and Rhode Island.

Mr. Shorto concurs and also points out that the Dutch did not have royalty like the British. The Netherlands was a republic where individuals could rise to power and status.

It is ironic that our government was founded on many of the same principles that the Dutch professed when they settled the colony in North America. If you want to have a clear idea of what it was like for people living in the Dutch colony, you must read this book.

Russell Shorto has worked extensively on the New Netherland Project, which is currently translating old documents from 1600-1664.