Naming Gerret Van Sweringen's family

Question

Gerret is a useful case study in how "last names at birth" change over time and place, and I'm looking for advice before creating wrong LNABs.

Gerret migrated from the Netherlands to New Netherland -- specifically Delaware -- before it was taken over by the English.  He then became a naturalized citizen of the Province of Maryland, and founded a prominent family.

He went by the name Gerret van Sweringen while on the North American side of the Atlantic.  An "a" soon entered his name and became Swearingen.  The next generation treated "Van" as a middle name and later it became a popular first name.

I am told, however, that van Sweringen was not his birth name because patronymics were the naming convention in the Netherlands at the time.  

Fredric Z. Saunders has done the best research I've seen and identified his grandfather and father.  Saunders identifies his grandfather as Aelbrecht Hendricksz, meaning, in English, Albert, Henry's son.  Saunders identifies Garret's father as Claes Aelbrechtsz.  

If one is following Dutch patronymics, would Gerret then be Gerret Claesz?  Saunders does not give a patronynic for Gerret.  His Current Last Name would then be Garret van Sweringen, a name he apparently adopted once he left home.  Once the proper LNAB is established, New Netherlands Project would need to be involved in changing it, since it is Project Protected.

The information is there to improve the profiles of Gerret and the two generations before him, but the names themselves are way beyond my pay grade.  Help!

Comments

There are lots of record images on https://www.familysearch.org/photos/artifacts/10312629 (which I believe is the file by Fons van Wieringen that is elsewhere called  Van Sweringen/Van Sweeringen from Rynsaterwoude /Woubrugge -- a link that doesn't take me to content), but I haven't managed to find the evidence and rationale for identifying Aelbert van Sweringen (the name I see on that page is Aelbert, not Aelbrecht) as the father of Gerrit.

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Hi Jack, imho the pdf from Fons van Wieringen, you mentioned from Familysearch, makes clear that the mentioned persons Surname is "van Sweringen". If you have proof that this person is the same person you found in the USA, than his (original) surname is 'van Sweringen' for sure. Did you fellow researchers that examined this family from Rijnsaterwoude? Greetings from The Netherlands, Peter de Wit.

Answer 1

Hi Jack,

I'm not a member of the Dutch Roots/Netherlands or New Netherlands Project, but as nobody is answering your question I thought to do a little investigation.

 I have to tell you that all the information that is on the internet is unsourced and I've seen a lot of incorrect information. It really made me laugh to see the FAG remarks, stating a) he was born in Rijnsaterwoude, Kaag en Braassem Municipality, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands,  but in the story below he is born in the Beemster in the North of the Netherlands, above Amsterdam. Those 2 places are so far apart that this is really impossible. I've checked the original Baptism records from 1636 in both Beemster and Rijsaterwoude, but there's no baptism at that date for a Gerrit/Garret.

I also don't know why they call him the Flying Dutchman on FAG and if he is called 'van Schweringen' than this would rather implicate that he is from Germany.

So I don't have any information for you, only the fact that I don't see any proof of him being born/baptized in the Beemster or Rijsaterwoude.

Lot's of success in finding out the 'truth'

Comments

Thanks, Margreet.  It appears that he only used the name "Van Sweringen" in North America, and that he would have gone by a patronymic name while growing up.  Fredric Z. Saunders' research is thorough and I think reliable;  so employing patronymics, Gerrit's grandfather was Aelbrecht Hendricksz, his father was Claes Aelbrechtsz, and so would Gerrit's name be Gerrit Claesz?  I'm relatively confident that Gerrit's name at birth would have been a patronymic name, but not clear on what the proper spelling would be.

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Jack,

If you don’t know if he’s really from the Netherlands and you don’t have a baptism record, then your question can’t be answered. By the way it’s really a mistake to think that every Dutch ancestor had a patronymic name. That also depends on the location where someone is born and if someone is poor or rich. So you’re guess is as good as mine.

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I have changed the incorrect province name.

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Thanks for searching for baptism records, Margreet. A baptism record would help us identify his parents, but it's not vital for determining his LNAB.

We don't have solid information on where this man was from, and it's not entirely clear that he was born in 1636 -- that date is based on the ages he gave (in America) on two occasions when he attested to his age, so I would treat it as "about 1636." It has, however, become clear to me that he was being called by the name "Gerrit van Sweringen" as early as April 1657 (date of "Order granting the request of Gerrit van Sweringen, supercargo of the Prins Mauritius to be discharged from the Company's  service," per Vol. 12 (1877), "History of the Dutch and Swedish Settlements on The Delaware River," of Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, at page xxiv), which is several decades before the British took control of New Netherland and started to demand use of family surnames instead of patronymics. Thus, it's reasonable to think that his Netherlands family also used the name van Sweringen. (And, anyway, our New Netherland project naming convention tells us to use the name found in the earliest record that calls the person by their own last name, which also directs us to van Sweringen.)

As New Netherland project leader, I'm changing the LNAB.

Answer 2

Hi Jack,

As Margreet has stated, it is impossible to create "the right" LNAB without a baptismal record. However, the lack of a baptismal record does not automatically mean that the LNAB needs to be a patronymic because also around 1630 fixed surnames were in use, esp. in this part of the Netherlands and with well-to-do families.

Gerrit is mentioned in the land owner records of Rijnsaterwoude in 1664, 1684, 1688, 1692 and 1696 in which his name is written as "Gerrit van Sweringen".

His father and grandfather are also mentioned in several documents e.g. the 1616 land owner records of Esselijkerwoude as "Aelbert Henricxz van Sweringen".

So, in this specific case the surname "Van Sweringen" was already commonly used. I did not find any documents in which his family used patronymics. In the absence of baptismal records, I would therefor use "Van Sweringen" as LNAB.

Comments

Thanks so much, Remko.  The sources I was following believed Gerrit began using the van Sweringen surname on the North American side of the Atlantic.  Your identification of property records in Rijnsaterwoude where he used the surname-- and especially that his father and grandfather used it, strongly supports its use as an LNAB.  I had created the father and grandfather using patronymic LNABs, but I have now converted them back to van Sweringen.  I"m assuming that van with a lower case "v" is appropriate and that usage with a capital "V" occurred later on the American side.

Since Gerrit's profile is project proteted by the New Netherlands Project, I'll want their OK before connecting Gerrit to the documented parents and disconnecting him from the unsourced parents.

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Indeed, "van" with a lower case.

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Yes, if you have found documentation that shows the current linked parents are incorrect, then it should be corrected.

Let me know if the PPP needs to be removed for this.

- Netherlands Project Coordinator.

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Fortunately, the New Netherland project's naming convention (described below) allows us to determine an LNAB (for WikiTree purposes, at least) without having a baptism record.

Answer 3

Regarding the LNAB, I refer you folks to the New Netherland project naming convention for LNABs (see the project page), wherein we try to use the name found on the earliest record (ideally a church record) that gives the person a name that is clearly their own name (not, for example, their father's patronymic name or a patronymic name devised from the father's first name), with the spelling found on the record.  Before this admittedly arbitrary policy was adopted, we had lively discussions (call them arguments if you will) about topics like (1) the "correct" LNAB for a child who was presumed to have had a patronymic name at birth, but there is no record of the person being called by a patronymic name (for example, we wondered that if the father was recorded with first name of "Thijs," should his LNAB be the patronymic "Thijsz" or a variant like "Tyszen" or "Matthyssen" or myriad other possibilities, none of which ever appear in the person's records?) and (2) competing theories on the national origins of immigrants who might have been French, Dutch, English, Frisian, German, or Scandinavian -- and whose LNABs were proposed to be based on members' personal opinions regarding the nationality.

Instead of imputing a last name based on supposition and speculation, we use the name on the record as the LNAB.  All other last names go into the Current Last Name or Other Last Names data field, and all variants (and any competing theories of national origin) should be identified/discussed in text.

For this man, we seem to have evidence for his place of origin (Rijnsaterwoud) -- but I don't remember where I saw mention of a record that showed that, plus a few records from that place (the land records that Remko found) that are likely to be his. It looks like some of the "records" cited for him are not faithful renderings of the records, but rather were reinterpreted in English. If the records really do refer to "Gerrit" or "Gerret" (given name) and "van Sweringen," then one of those given names and the last name "van Sweringen" seem like good approximations of his given name and LNAB.

NOTE: The names "Garrett" and "Van Swearingen" look to me like English translations of Dutch names. And "van" is a Dutch-language preposition that should be rendered in lower case.

Answer 4

Note that the patronymic naming scheme was very common in the North of the Netherlands, but Rijnsaterwoude is in Holland, where family names were and are more common.

I would keep the current one unless someone produces a true baptismal record.

Answer 5

Hi Jack,

I have added the links to the orgininal Land Records of Rijnsterwoude including the pages on which one can find Gerrit van Sweringen being mentioned. They can be found on pages 19, 33, 40, 48, 56 and 64 out of 124 pages. This equals the years 1664 till 1696 with a 4 year interval. I have also looked at the years 1600 and 1704. As mentioned by researcher Fons van Wieringen in his excellent document it seems that Gerrit van Sweringen bought his plot of land from Dammas Gerritsz de Groot. Interestingly, in 1661/1662 when Gerrit sailed from Amsterdam to America, one Gerrit de Groott from Ryntsterwoude was on board. Gerrit seems to be the son of Dammas Gerritsz de Groot. I wil try to get extra proof of this.

I have also found that Martha van Sweringen, who apparently made a will in which she mentions Gerrit as her brother, was the daughter of Hendrick Aelberts van Sweringen. Unfortunately I have not been able to track this elusive will yet. This would mean that not Claes but his brother Hendrick was the father of Gerrit.