Post here to join us in the New Netherland Settlers Project

+49 votes
10.6k views

WikiTree's New Netherland Settlers Project is our collaborative effort to develop and maintain high-quality genealogy information for the people of New Netherland and their descendants.

New Netherland was the 17th-century Dutch colony in eastern North America (mostly in the modern states of New York and New Jersey) controlled by the Dutch West India Company.  Many New Netherland settlers were Dutch, but quite a few of them came from other European places such as Germany, Scandinavia, France, England, Scotland, and the Mediterranean region; some were enslaved Africans; and indigenous Native Americans were part of their community. The scope of the New Netherland Settlers Project currently includes New Netherland descendants born as late as 1776, if they were part of a community where the Dutch culture of New Netherland was prevalent.

If you are interested in participating with this project, please answer this post to join us. In your answer, please tell us about why you are interested in New Netherland (include names of any specific ancestors or New Netherland surnames you are interested in) and tell us how you expect to contribute to the project.

Project members will receive the New Netherland Settlers Project badge on their profiles.

This project is only for WikiTree members. If you are not yet a member of WikiTree, please join the WikiTree community before requesting membership here. See Help:How to Use WikiTree to get started.

Also, we ask project members to:

  1. Add new_netherland to your followed tags.
  2. After you have been accepted into the project, request to join our Google Group, and include your name and Wikitree ID in your request.
  3. Add the category [[Category:New_Netherland_Settlers_Project]] including the brackets, to your biography.

If you have questions about New Netherland or the project, you may find answers on the FAQ page or the New Netherland Settlers Project page. See our advice on reliable sources on the New Netherland Settlers Reliable Sources page and see additional project resources and sourcing advice on our New Netherland Genealogy Resources category. You may even find your ancestors on our Progenitors and Immigrants of the New Netherlands Settlers (though it is quite incomplete!)

PS - Please ANSWER in this G2G thread.

in Requests for Project Volunteers by Ellen Smith G2G Astronaut (1.5m points)
edited by Ellen Smith
I am interested in joining the New Netherlands project. I am Landsman-55. My Grandmother was Edna Jane Van Benschoten. I found a lot of my Dutch ancestors back to the Vignes due to the efforts of many of you who traced the Van Benschoten (Bunschoten) line and the first boy born in New Netherlands. I would love to learn more and be part of this project. — L Landsman (Landsman-55)
Hello! I would like to join. My New Netherland family that I am researching currently are: Burghardt, Van Hoesen, Van Wie, Van Valkenburg, Klauw, Slingerland, Santvoord, Middaugh, Bergen, and Rapalje. I would like to contribute in helping research not only my families but others as well. I love tying things together and digging into things to solve mysteries and make connections. I am a mom, so I research in bits here and there, but I do love focusing on chunks at a time and am working hard to go back through my chart and document and re-verify everything that I have found or have been given by the previous generation of researchers in my family. I also recently found a New Netherlands connection in my husband's family. ~Sharman Rice (Lutz-3115)
Hello!  I am so excited to see this group and would love to join.  I have only recently found out that our family history reaches back this far, and I have become obsessed learning as much as I can about our roots.  My name is Julena Johnson Doudt, and my ancestors include the Crankheyte, Syboutzen, Ryder, deLint, Pieters, etc.  I have even found out that one of them was included in the 60 or so people who managed to escape the Massacre at Naarden.  (I am humbled by knowing that I would not exist if he hadn't escaped!)
Me please if you don't mind ,
Hello! I’m Laurie Cable Olsson, Cable-115. I was fascinated to discover my Dutch ancestors while researching several years ago. Some of them include Romeyn, Van Dyke, Wyckoff, Haegen, Dirckse, Janse.

I would love to collaborate with others on improving our ancestors profiles.

I am working on processing the backlog of requests that were posted as comments. [Folks: Please post your request by using the Answer this post button.]

A hearty welcome to the New Netherland Settlers project to John Diefenbach, Nathaniel Eaton, Kristin Robinson, Mitchell Wilcox.

You all have the badge now. smiley

More welcomes to new project members Jan Wink, Jared Crayk, Julena Doudt, and Laurie (Cable) Olsson. heart We look forward to your contributions.

Thank you very much, Ellen! Looking forward to participating in this project!
Hello, my name is Dawn Stansell (Harrold)  I'm very curious about this group as I have relatives who were in New York area in the time of this period.  My 9th removed Great grandmother was Elizabeth De Graff, born in 1697, who married my Great grandfather Nicholas Stansell ,born in 1669, in 1710 in New York. Her parents were Claas De Graff and Elisabeth Brouwer.If eligible I would love to join.
Welcome to Dawn.

405 Answers

+12 votes
I am interested in joining the group to share research concerning one or two of my lineages. My ancestor, Thomas Davis / Davids, born c. 1685 in Albany (of Barnabas Davis II, born c. 1640 in MA) married twice(?) in NY / old New Netherlands; his children were (at least) Robert, John, Catherine, Thomas (born Albany, later of Plymouth), and David (born Albany, later of Edgartown). Thomas II and David appear in the Dutch Reformed Church records, baptized in 1722 and 1724 to "Thomas and Mary Davids." Thomas Sr. removed from NY to North Carolina about 1730 and lived in both Chowan and Scuppernong, but sent the youngest boys back to New England in the late 1730s for schooling / apprenticeships. His 1762 NC will connects all of his living children in New England and Carolina. I have conflicting data from published and manuscript records about Thomas' wife and the mother of the children, which I hope to resolve. Names of the women include Mary, Maicke Millington (? of Thomas Millington and Trynte Wendel), and Katarina / Caterina / Catherine Wendell (a very common name); the wife's name at his death was Elizabeth. One marriage date was c. 1709, according to one MS.
by Anonymous Woodard G2G Crew (560 points)
edited by Anonymous Woodard

Thank you for joining us, Anonymous.

It does appear that you have some New Netherland ancestry, but there may be some scrambled genealogy in the outline you provide. It would be unusual for a New Englander like Barnabas Davis to end up in Albany in 1685, and anyway there is evidence that Barnabas probably died before November 1685. There is an existing profile for the Thomas Davis you describe, but it is sourced only to an unsourced Ancestry Tree that identifies his parents as the parents of Barnabas born about 1640. It also would be unusual for a man born in Albany in 1685 to end up dying on an island on the North Carolina coast. Unless there is a source somewhere that documents the eventful life story suggested by the profile data, I suspect that multiple men of the same name may have gotten confused or conflated. We have some challenges ahead of us!

PS - Please change your followed tag to new_netherland instead of new_netherlands (which is not used as a tag).

+11 votes
Hi I  have several New Netherland lines, which I  discovered when I  traced a DAR line. My lines include Slingerland,  van der Zee, Bradt, Lansing, Halenbeck, van Vorst, van Buskirk, and others.
by Sherrye Woodworth G2G6 (6.1k points)
Welcome to this project, Sherrye. You do seem to have a generous helping of New Netherlanders!

You will find plenty of cousins here who share some of those names. Tracing members of some of these families through the 1700s can be a challenge (too many people of similar names and not enough records), but I hope we can make progress together.
As a young man, I worked on a Van der Zee House, in Coeman's Hollow, NY.
+12 votes
I would like to join this group. My New Netherlands ancestors are Van Aken's and Westbroek's among others.
by Colleen Jousma G2G6 Mach 1 (12.9k points)

Glad to have you here, Colleen. :-)

You seem to be descended from several of the New Netherland families who resettled in the Minisink Valley region of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania -- a confusing geographic situation for 21st century like us who often think of geography in terms of state lines. See the Minisink section of our church records page for information about the free sources for the church records we rely on for much of the genealogy of those Minisink folks.

You and I share van Aken ancestry, but WikiTree says you and I are only 9th cousins -- our most recent common ancestors are the immigrant ancestors Marinus van Aken and Pieternelle de Pre.

Thank you for the link. I will definitely be checking it out.

Glad to be here and I hope I can help find new things that will grow the tree for New Netherlands ancestors.
+12 votes
Hi, I  discovered my dutch mohawk ancestry when doing a DAR application. I  have quite a few lines of early settlers including Slingerland,  Lansing, Bradt, and van der Zee.
by Sherrye Woodworth G2G6 (6.1k points)
You have the badge now, Sherrye. Sorry I was so slow!
+11 votes
Hi, I have several "Dutch Mohawk" lines that I discovered when I reearched my Arnold line for DAR.  I discovered the Arnold was really Arnhout, and descended from the van der ZEE family.  I have researched these lines so could help with this project.
by Sherrye Woodworth G2G6 (6.1k points)
So glad you discovered your Dutch roots, Sherrye!
+11 votes
My ancestor for this project is Peter Westfall (c. 1768), married to Barbara Achenbach - their daughter Caroline Westfall Parks is my ggg grandmother and I would like to link them up and add some siblings, etc
by Kathleen Morris G2G3 (3.7k points)
Hi, Kathleen. Welcome to this project!

I found the profile you created for your Peter Westfall, added a baptism record, and linked him up to the existing profiles for his parents -- who also happen to be my direct ancestors!

I was not sure if you would find the profiles for the parents, largely due to spelling variations. I find that he was baptized as Petrus (not Peter) and under our NNS project implementation of WikiTree naming conventions his LNAB should be Westphal (the name given for his father at his baptism), not Westfall. The crazy variation in names (both first and last names) is a central feature of the New Netherland Settlers Project. The most useful thing we can do to deal with the variations is to document every name we find in the profile (both in the biography section and in the profile data on top). Also, we stick to a somewhat arbitrary set of rules about LNAB, as outlined on our project page (the naming conventions have helped us avoid many arguments).

There are plenty more children, siblings, etc., to be added, as well as more sourced details in the biographies.
+11 votes
hello,im interested im this projectas i beleive im a direct decsendent of the VanMeter and Dubois branches coming up from henry.
by Kelly Kersey G2G6 Mach 1 (12.9k points)
Welcome to this project, Kelly. I am sorry it has taken me so long to welcome you.

I am aware of some problems/conflicts related to the genealogy of the Van Meters, so this is a family line whose genealogy will require patience and diplomacy on the part of descendants like you.
+11 votes

My patrilineal 9ggf [[Andrieszen-8|Jochem Andrieszen]] came from Amsterdam to New Amsterdam between 1647 and 1659.  His mother-in-law, [[Kip-15|Baertje Hendricks Kip]], my 10ggm, also migrated from Amsterdam to New Amsterdam.  I would start with those two.  They are both PPP already however.

by Living Anderson G2G6 Mach 7 (78.6k points)

Hi, Thom. Thank you for joining this project. smiley

Be advised that there is plenty more to do in documenting the profiles of pretty much everybody in the New Netherland Project. Project protection absolutely does NOT mean a profile is practically perfect. The purpose of project protection is to prevent ill-considered merges and LNAB changes; it is NOT a seal of approval for the profile contents, sourcing, format, or anything else, and it does not prevent editing to improve the profile. The New Netherland Project uses PPP for its intended purpose only, and in fact we have applied PPP to some atrocious profiles simply to prevent bad merges.

Oh, by the way, the patronymic names for New Netherland settlers should not be treated as middle names. If a person has both a patronymic and a modern-style surname, the patronymic is treated as part of the first name. (The project follows the same policy as the Netherlands project in this regard.) See our project page for additional info on naming conventions.

+10 votes
Hello fellow Dutch settlers.  I am James Russell Van Camp, native of N.J.  My genealogical research indicates I am descended from Gerrit Jansen Van Campen/Kampen who is found in New Amsterdam in 1658.  Have done Y-DNA testing that has matches with several other present day Van Camps.

I have no idea how I could be of use, but am proud of our heritage, and would gladly return to Kampen in the Netherlands if invited.
by
James, you were not logged in when you posted. If you are member of WikiTree, please log in and claim your post. If you have not yet joined WikiTree, you will need to become a full member before you can join this project.

Are you Van_Camp-399? If so, please sign the Honor Code so you can join this project. smiley

+10 votes
My direct  ancestor arrived in New Amsterdam from the Netherlands in 1646 aboard the ship De Princes.  His name was Jacob Leurtss Leurzen van Kuykendall.
by

Hi, Terrell. You were not logged in when you posted, but I found you at Kuykendall-1817 smiley You have the project badge now. Thanks for joining us! yes

You may be surprised to learn that the Kuykendall family of New Netherland has an exceptionally large number of living descendants, so many of your distant cousins have contributed content (and mistakenly created a number of duplicate profiles over time) for your earliest New Netherland ancestors. The profile for that earliest immigrant ancestor you named is Leurtss-1. You will note that that profile and others are still in need of additional cleanup  the concatenation of contents from numerous duplicate profiles.

+9 votes
I am very interested in this project as I have known ancestors who settled in Ulster County, NY. Surnames of better-known families in my background are Freer, Bevier, Geer. I am in search of the origins of my father's surname, York, which is found in 1600s church records as Jurk, Jork, among others. Therefore, I don't know if my family originated in the Netherlands or England.
by K. York G2G Crew (470 points)

Thank you for volunteering, K. I need to ask you to sign the Honor Code before I can give you the project badge.

+10 votes
My Kuykendall ancestors arrived in 1646; I would like to join your group.

Thanks for your consideration.
by Terrell Gibson G2G2 (2.8k points)

You are a member now. smiley

+10 votes
My 6th great grandfather is Pieter Cornelis Breyandt (VanSteenwyck), my 5th, Cornelis Breyandt, etc.

I have spent time doing research at the Holland Society, and my Aunt has written a book available there called "The Ancestors of Simeon Alfred and Adrianna (Green) Bryant."

I would love to see if we can get our people back to the Netherlands, and would love to join this group.
by Ben Bryant G2G Crew (500 points)

I am glad that you have joined us, Ben! I wager that very few project members have visited the Holland Society.

Your early post-immigration ancestors have profiles here, such as https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Breyandt-2 , and those profiles would benefit from tender loving care to add sources, correct errors, add biography text, etc. You should not be afraid to edit these profiles, but if you are contemplating major changes (like swapping out one set of parents for another), please communicate before editing, either on the profile or in G2G. And please be mindful of the project conventions on names (see the project page) and the need for reliable sources.

+9 votes
I am a distant relative of Christian Barendtse van Horn (1625-1658) married with Jannetje van Horn (1629-1694) Born in the Netherlands the were early settlers. I am examinating this family as well interested in New Netherlands colony in general. Adriaen van der Donck one of the leaders of the colony was born in Breda, the city where i live in
by Living Lelieveldt G2G6 (8.0k points)

I am pleased to welcome you to this project as one of the Dutch cousins to New Netherland. We have benefited a great deal from across-the-ocean collaborations.

If you are interested in Adriaen van der Donck, you might want to read The Island at the Center of the World, by Russell Shorto. It is nonfiction, with van der Donck as one of the central characters of the story.

+9 votes
I am James R Van Camp and am descended from Gerrit Jansen Van Kampen/Campen who served in New Amsterdam with Peter Stuyvesant since before 1658.  Born in New Jersey, did my first genealogical research and New Jersey Archives where I once actually held the Last Will.. of my Revolutionary era ancestor Gilbert Van Camp who died in 1802. Have read The Island at the Center of the World  by Russell Shorto and was hooked on this Dutch thing
by James Van Camp G2G Crew (780 points)
I look forward to your contributions, James! Please sign the Honor Code, then I can give you the badge.
+10 votes
My middle name is Van Nest and I'm very interested in learning more about my ancestors from this Dutch part of my family. I am pretty certain I can trace back to when the Van Nest and Law families came together. I just want to help fill in the gaps and learn more.
by Adam Law G2G Crew (500 points)

Welcome to this project, Adam. We have a nest-full of Van Nests on WikiTree (sorry, but I could not resist that play on words) and when I skimmed that list I found a Van Nest woman who married a Law, but there are many gaps waiting for you to fill in the info.

+10 votes
I’d like to join the project. I have a few relatives that came during the PGM, but then I started working on my BIL’s tree. He has over 160 relatives that came during the PGM - and I’m still working! There are so many relatives in the colonies I thought it was time to learn a little more on the topic.
by v. Wilson G2G6 Mach 2 (22.3k points)
edited by v. Wilson
Hello v.
I just came on the NNS project and going through the backlog of people who requested to join. I want to confirm first your continued interest in the project. In particular, I wanted to make sure that you actually are interested in New Netherlands, since you only mention PGM in your post. I see you do have recent Dutch ancestors, so the Dutch_Roots project may have interest for you as well. NNS focuses ancestors who were Dutch immigrants to America in the 1600s. Please let me know if you still have interest in this group.
So sorry my nomenclature was confusing. I was just trying to point out all the branches I was searching that had arrived in the early 1600’s. But I have taken on a few other projects since requesting to join. I am also in the hospital right now, so I will pass on joining. Thanks for the reply.
+10 votes
Hello Ellen! I am a descendant of the Dutch Drakes. My DNA is consistent with the "Dutch Drakes" in Chris Chester's Drake Genealogy Database.  In fact, after 20 years working on this, I find that my own research has resulted essentially in Wikitree's findings as well as Chris'. I have constructed a descendants' chart from Augustus Grasset (Grasset-1), through his daughter Martha Ann, (Grasset-3) who married Joseph Oldfield (Oldfield-31) and had a daughter who had a child, Martha (Oldfield-170), who married John Drake originally known as Jans Dratz (Drake-115), the son of Josias Janszen Dratz (Drats-2) and Aeltje Brouwer (Brouwers-70), the daughter of Adam Brouwer (Brouwer-102).  I'd love to send it to you.

  John Drake and Martha Oldfield had a son Benjamin Drake (Drake-158), my fifth great-grandfather, who was married to my fifth great--grandmother Sarah Smith (Smith-177193) for a short period that produced Joseph Drake (Drake-5968) through Margarietje Westfael, the grand-daughter of Jacobus Westfael (Westvaal-476).  The Westfael line on wikitree is woefully inadequate, but I'm not changing anything until I see that 1753 indenture.  I'm a real genealogist, you see, having been the registrar for my local chapter of the SAR and having taken numerous classes from the NEHGS.

  I am missing one document.  Several internet resources, including Chris Chester's  says there is an indenture of 7 Aug 1753 identifying Benjamin Drake's (Drake-158) wife as Sarah being FHL film # 0828547, but sadly the Family History Center in my town is closed due to COVID.  I have no reason to doubt Chris Chester's work, though.

  Also, what is this about the project needing another manager?

Kindest regards, Douglas Drake
by Douglas Drake G2G1 (1.0k points)
Hello Douglas,

I am going through the backlog of answers to this post, and I found your interesting response. I am possibly a descendant of Adam Brouwer as well, although my connection through his grandson to his great-granddaughter has some uncertainy. However, that is my umbilical line, so I hope someday that mtDNA will add some confidence to the connection.

I see some of the profiles you mention require some serious cleanup, such as Augustus Grasset, so I encourage you to consider being the one to step in and add some quality sources.

Are you interested in joining the NNS project, or was this a message just introducing yourself. I am happy to give you the badge and invite you to the Google group if you'd like to join. The group has a daily digest of changes to NNS profiles, and there may be quite a bit of that activity that interests you that you wouldn't hear about about without joining the group.

Regards,
Barry

P.S. I made an appointment to visit my local FHC and got a nice visit in. If yours is still mostly closed, it may be worth finding out if they are letting people visit by appointment.
+10 votes
Hello.  I have many ancestors that I believe qualify as New Netherlands Settlers, including Ostrander, Veeder, Vedder, Van Vliet, Van Benschoten, Van Oostrum, Van Voorhoudt, Glen, Schermerhorn, Schepmoes, Peeck, du Trieux, Mebie, Bradt, and De Vos.  I have been trying to trace my lineage as best I can.
by Anonymous Ostrander G2G Crew (500 points)
Hello,

I am going through the old answers on this post. I see that you never became a member, but if you are willing to come back and officially become a member, I would be happy to talk about the NNS project.

Regards,

Barry
+10 votes
I am a descendant of Albertus Hendrickson (Hendricks), born in Maersen, Netherlands in 1641.  He emigrated to New Amsterdam in 1662 as an indentured servant to Joost de la Grange.
by J. Little G2G Crew (500 points)
Hello J.

I am going through these old answers and responding to them. I see you haven't edited Wikitree for a few months now. If you are still interested in NNS, please let me know. Also, I noticed that Lester Hendrix is agnate to you and has a Y-DNA test. Since you are 8th cousins, it would be pretty amazing confirmation if you also took a Y-DNA test and confirmed your match to Lester. I wish I could do that with my own lines, but so far I either can trace male lines back so far or else cannot find living male cousins to test the Y-chromosome.

Regards,

Barry

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