Hi all, Recently I did some work on one Delaware family -- Wybrech Jans who married Barent Hendricks, then Jan Siericks, and third John Walker the younger. Wybrech's daughter Agneitje Barents was married to Rutgert Hudde, Andries Hudde's the youngest child. After this work I backtracked in search of Dutch records on Andries Hudde and his first wife, Geertruyt Bornstra, and of her sister Margrieta. Margrieta Bornstra married Crispyn de Foreest of Leiden in 1636, and on the same day her sister Geertruyt Bornstra married Crispyn's cousin Hendrick de Foreest of Leiden, who died aboard the ship "Rensselaerwyck" during its July 1637 voyage to Manhattan from the Virginias. Geertruyt Bornstra married second in 1639 (banns in Amsterdam) to Andries Hudde(n), born 1608, who lived in New Amsterdam, where he served as councillor and as surveyor-general. After 1645 he served in several positions in the Delaware, including commis at Ft. Nassau, and held positions at Ft. Casimir and New Amstel. Andries Hudde died of a fever on 4 November 1663 at his plantation along Drawyer's Creek in the Appoquinimink region of Delaware [Delaware Papers Dutch (Gehring), 337], leaving a second wife "Geertie" and their two-year-old son Rutgert, later known as Richard Hudden. Rutgert Hudden, baptized on 26 June 1661 in New Amsterdam, was not Geertruyt Bornstra's son. Geertruyt Bornstra had died before 31 July, 1657, which is known since Jacob Alrichs shortly thereafter acknowledged Peter Stuyvesant's written approval of Andries Hudde's request to remarry [PA Arch II, 7:512]. Rutgert Hudde was Andries Hudde's child with his second wife, coincidentally called "Geertie," whose parents are not yet known. After Andries Hudde's death, she married second to Cornelis Jorissen who died in 1678, and third to Gerrit Otto(sen), who had arrived at New Amstel on "der Purmerlander Kerck" on 3 Feb. 1662. Gerrit Otto served as a justice on the New Castle court from 1676 to 1682, and died in 1684. This "Geertie" died as the widow of Gerrit Otto, between February and June, 1685. [Records of the Court of New Castle on Delaware, 2:169]. Further information on the BORNSTRA Family Many people probably have the two BORNSTRA sisters in their genealogical databases. Several databases including these two women can be found online. But there has been a myth perpetuated for at least the last 120 years concerning the origins of these two Bornstra sisters, which now proves to be incorrect. In Riker's 1904 Revised History of Harlem pp. 89-90 < http://books.google.com/books?id=e38MAAAAYAAJ > and in his earlier work, Harlem (City of New York): Its Origin and Early Annals (pub. 1881), p. 100 < http://books.google.com/books?id=0m4UAAAAYAAJ > is a discussion of the Bornstra sisters, their husbands and in-laws, and their plans for coming to the Dutch colonies in North America. But these are a few problems in his treatment of the Bornstra family --notably an incorrect birthplace for the Bornstra sisters! No clue how this idea came to Riker, but here are the misconceptions I found in and as a result of the Riker discussions, that need revision: 1. The Bornstra sisters were absolutely not from Friesland. They were born, baptized, and raised in Amsterdam, of parents who had six children baptized in Amsterdam. Their father's name can be found in property deeds of Amsterdam. Banns for their marriages were published in June 1636 in Amsterdam for the two Bornstra--de Foreest marriages, and the later Bornstra--Hudde marriage, all of which indicate these women were from Amsterdam. Cor Snabel obtained their marriage records from the Stadsarchief of Amsterdam, which we transcribed and I translated. The Regional Archief Leiden also gives the hometown of the Bornstra sisters as Amsterdam. Banns were published there shortly after their publication in Amsterdam, since their fiancees, Hendrick and Crispyn de Foreest, lived in Leiden. 2. "Secretary van Neck" who signed off on the father's consent for the two sisters' marriages, was also from Amsterdam, and not from a place called "Nieuwlant" in Friesland. Indeed he was Secretaris Reynier (Simonsz) van Neck, baptized in the Oude kerk of Amsterdam on 4 Feb. 1582, who died in 1654 in Amsterdam. He was first a zijdelakenkoper (merchant dealing in a type of silk fabric), but later held the official position of Secretaris van huwelijkse zaken (Marital Affairs) in Amsterdam. This office was responsible for checking people's marriage credentials --ages and eligibility to marry, attestations from other cities, permissions from parents or guardians, etc. The Bornstra sisters had a written letter of permission to marry from their father, Wybrant Andries Bornstra, in lieu of his physical presence at the office, since he was a courier travelling to and from Dordrecht, a city in Zuid-Holland, located south of Rotterdam. Secretary van Neck's office had examined and approved Wybrant Andries Bornstra's letter of permission. 3. The place '''t Nieuwelant' in the Bornstra sisters' marriage records of 1636 probably reflects a recently established suburb of Amsterdam, later engulfed as the city expanded around and beyond it. The toponym ''t Nieuwelant' (translated as 'the new land') is a widely-used generic term. At different times, this term was a toponym referring to various and sundry places in the Netherlands. A location called 't Nieuwelant' was usually a newly-established polder which had recently been diked, dried out, finished and built upon. Until it had a better name, this recently-created location was simply called ''t Nieuwelant.' At Amsterdam circa 1600, this would have been an outlying area, similar to what we think of today as a suburb. The process of land creation is still happening today --see the coast of Friesland in google maps, which reveals many new dikes, pump stations, and even the pipelines that carry the water out to sea. These emerging polders are becoming the newest of the new lands. Jan Schellinger aboard the 1637 voyage of the "Rensselaerwyck" wrote to his wife in January, during the time the ship was held in port at Ilfracombe, England. The address he gives for his wife's residence is "outside the riggeliers pooert at the ossemaerckt in the nieiuetuin at Amsterdam" [Van Rensselaer Bowier manuscripts, p. 347]. The 'nieuwetuin' indicates that this location is, or recently was, a place where gardens had been made, near the Regulierspoort (along the Amstel River). At the time this letter was written, this was near the edge of the city, but now, of course, it's quite in the middle. Probably 't Nieuwelant, location of the Bornstra residence in 1636, was similarly at the edge of the city. Records of the Bornstra family In a message immediately following this one, I am posting sets of marriage, baptism and burial records for the family of Wybrant Andries Bornstra and his wife Geertruyt Pieters, from Dutch records. In two of the baptism records, Wybrant Andries was called "bode op Dort" which means he was a 'messenger' or 'courier' who travelled between Amsterdam and Dordrecht. His earlier occupation was recorded simply as Koopman --merchant. As the marriage documents reveal, the Bornstra sisters sign with their surname, BORNSTRA. Baptismal records that I obtained from the Stadsarchief of Amsterdam for these sisters and their siblings, born between 1597 and 1614, follow below, including names of the baptismal witnesses. In the baptism records, the father is known as Wybrant Andries, but by 1623, property records indicate that the family surname had become Bornstra. With thanks to Cor Snabel who obtained the three Bornstra marriage records, assisted in transcribing, and who helped demystify the "myth" of Nieuwelant, and who as usual did a stellar job of proofreading my work. Best wishes, Liz J