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THE STORY OF
NEW NETHERLAND.
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CHAPTER VIII.
THE RENSSELAERWIJK COLONY
 VAN
RENSSELAER’S colony was planted on ground that was sacred and classic
in Iroquois tradition. Here was the Eastern Door of the Long House. Naturally
one expects to find the gateway into the Iroquois country where two valleys
and streams join, at the confluence of the Mohawk with the Hudson. Eastbound
travelers in moccasin and canoe, however, made detour at Schenectady.
By turning to the right into the valley of Norman’s Kill, and following
the stream southwardly, they avoided the shallow windings of the lower
Mohawk, the sandhills of Niskayuna, and the great falls at Cohoes. This
trail from Niagara and the Far West formed the great Indian highway of
America.
At Tawasentha on
the Hudson was one of the most sacred places in Iroquois tradition. Besides
being “the place of many dead,” it was the home of Hiawatha,
the great culture-hero, and the reputed founder of the league of the Five
Nations. Here, with burial of the tomahawk and smoking of the calumet,
councils were held and treaties compacted between various tribes. Here
they first met the white man, exchanging furs for fire-water and the firearms
with which they humbled their vassals.
On their westward
route, they avoided the hills, sands, and cataracts northward, and through
the valley of Norman’s Kill rejoined the Mohawk trail. The “kill”
took its name from Andries Bradt, who was a Norman, Northman, or Norseman,
that is, a Dane, or of Danish extraction, who settled on its banks in
1630. This pretty stream, with its flower-lined cliffs and alluring rock
crannies, meandering through daisy-clothed meadows, recalls in its name
the home of the Vikings.
The first covenant
of friendship between the Iroquois and the Hollanders was here entered
into by Jacob Eelkins in 1617. Adrian Joris, a wise and energetic superintendent,
confirmed the compact in 1623.
Daniel van Kriekenbeek,
the successor of Joris, was less wary and more susceptible to Indian eloquence.
Opposite, on the east side of the river, at Green Bush, rose the palisaded
castle of the Mohicans. In 1626 they asked the Dutch commandant to aid
them in a raid against the Mohawks. Kriekenbeek foolishly consented, and
set out with six of his men towards Schenectady, but the Western red men
were alert, and the whole party was driven back by a volley of arrows.
Among the many slain were four Dutchmen, including the commandant. Then
the white people learned to their horror that the Iroquois were, on some
occasions at least, cannibals. They first roasted and ate one Hollander,
probably an unusually brave fighter. Then the victors tools back a leg
and an arm to hang up in their council house to show that Europeans were
not invincible. Other similar instances proved that cannibalism, though
not usual, was neither excessively rare nor practiced in mere bravado.
Hunger was sufficient to fill the kettle with human flesh, when other
food was not at hand or was difficult to procure.
When Peter Barentsen,
the new commandant for Fort Orange, arrived on the scene from Manhattan,
the Iroquois hastened to explain the recent unpleasant affair. They justified
themselves, and declared that they had no enmity with the Dutch. Barentsen
accepted the explanation. Packs of furs were brought in, and peaceful
traffic was resumed.
Barentsen was relieved
by Captain Sebastian Krol, or Crol (pronounced Crull), a church elder,
a comforter of the sick, and one of the shining characters of New Netherland.
To him is ascribed the cruller, or Krol-yer, a toothsome delicacy of high
repute. The word is unknown in Holland, and the makers of dictionaries
have vainly endeavored to derive the word from the Dutch, or German krullen,
to curl. When provisions were short, or the bill of fare at Fort Orange
was monotonous, Captain Krol supplied a new sort of olekoek, that
is, “fried cake,” “doughnut,” or compound of flour,
eggs, butter, and sugar. Krol, with his “erollers,” added a
new delicacy to the frontier table.
Krol was a church
officer, and occasionally went down the river to Manhattan to sit in the
Consistory Meeting of the First Reformed Church in North America. With
Domine Michaelius he grieved at the loose morals of a new community, and
at “the speech of Ashdod” heard from the half-breeds. However,
unlike that other colonial governor, Nehemiah, Krol did not smite or pluck
off the hair of the fathers. Rather, like Malachi, he palliated the situation,
for many of the Dutch pioneers had left home before being married. “Let
none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth” — even
if she were a squaw — was good advice.
The lonely Dutch
bachelors were soon to have brides from home. In 1630 Krol was delighted
to receive an order from Kilian van Rensselaer to purchase for him, from
the Iroquois proprietors, a great estate. The commissary, the overseer
of farms, and a company of farmers furnished with tools, implements, and
cattle would shortly arrive. A church and school, with a domine and master,
were also promised to complete the new manor.
The Patroon of Nijkerk
fitted up a comfortable ship, named the Eendracht, or Unity, from the
motto of the Republic, Eendracht maaght macht, which means “Unity
makes strength,” and put her under the charge of Captain John Brouwer.
The colonists could not feel safe until they were well out on the ocean,
because of the Dunkirkers, or Belgian-Spanish pirates. The admiralty,
or naval station at Dunkirk, for privateers and war vessels flying the
Spanish flag, had been organized by the Duke of Parma in 1583. In four
years these pirates had become so dangerous that the States-General ordered
that when captured no mercy be shown to either masters or men. In many
a Dutch port the gallows stood ready, and the hangman began his work at
once. Dutch vessels could go out only in convoy or heavily armed. Even
then, the Dunkirkers could sometimes by numbers overcome four or five
state ships, even men-of-war, saving themselves and their booty behind
the dangerous Flemish sandbanks. Many a ship bound for America was thus
caught and plundered, and its passengers were held to ransom. For sixty
years this war on the waters between the Dutch sailors and the Dunkirkers
continued. It was to root the pirates out of their lairs that the States-General
sent Maurice, their young commander-in-chief, into the enemy’s country.
Though the supreme object was not then attained, the decisive victory
of Newport was gained in June, 1600, and incidentally fresh honor came
to the van Rensselaers from this campaign, as we shall now see.
Descendants of the
Crusaders, this family bore on the shield of their arms a cross of the
Knights of St. John, silver on a red ground, with the motto, Niemand
Zonder, or “No man without” (a cross). Now, at their city
home in Amsterdam, they were to receive a special honor from Prince Maurice.
Heer van Rensselaer was one of the cavalcade of mounted gentlemen who
constituted the prince’s escort of honor when, after his victory,
he entered that city in triumphant array. He hung cressets, or iron baskets
of fire, around the walls and on the roof of his mansion, and the effect
was so striking that Maurice, summoning the householder, congratulated
him on his artistic triumph, and told him to take as his family motto
Omnibus effulgeo, “I outshine all.” The flaming torch
in an iron basket henceforth became part of the wapen, or arms,
of the head of the van Rensselaer house. |
| The
passenger list of the ship Unity was made up of mechanics, farmers, and
capable men with families, people who had grown up together from childhood.
The women were especially well fitted to be the ancestresses of families
that should attain renown. In Holland girls were as well educated in the
public schools as were boys. After a maidenhood spent in mastery of household
science and art, they became real partners with their husbands in their
business or enterprises. We shall hear further about several of these
typical Dutch women, whose Bibles, silver-clasped and held in hand or
at belt, chatelaines holding keys, tablets, needle-cases, etc., cake-moulds,
dresses, linen chests, and what-not, are still in the possession of their
descendants. There was Maryje (that is, little Mary or Maria) Jonas, who
was the midwife, or “trained nurse,” of the period. With her
came two young and handsome daughters who quickly learned the language
of the Indians, and were always friends of the red men. It was her daughter
Annetje, better known as “Anneke” Janse, with whom the young
fellow Roelof Janse, in the employ of the Patroon, fell desperately in
love. They were married, and four children were born to them, and these
became more famous than even their ambitious mother, perhaps, dreamed
they would be.
Of Annetje, or little
Ann, tradition says that she was lively, energetic, smart, frugal, with
rosy cheeks and snapping black eyes, and that she kept her good looks
until she died of a good old age. By her thrift and wifely help, her husband
was able in a few years to leave the service of the Patroon, and bidding
good-by to feudalism, to live on Manhattan. He bought a farm of sixty
acres overlooking the Hudson River, but died soon after his arrival, leaving
a buxom and pretty widow. “Anneke Janse” married Domine Bogardus,
to her social advantage, and is the ancestress of many thousands of people.
Her sister Maryje excelled even Anneke, for she married three times, and
had a child by each husband, thus having much to do with the founding
of three families. These were typical women of New Netherland.
Why Kilian van Rensselaer’s
proved to be the host colony will be seen when we glance at the old home
of his agents and colonists in Guelderland. “Like fathers like sons.”
Nor is it any accident that near Fort Orange and Rensselaerwijk are Guilderland
and Guilderland Center, of sweet personal or ancestral memory to thousands
of Americans. To see these people at home is to know them as they were,
for better or worse, and to understand what they would bring with them.
We shall later cross the ocean, view the monuments, read the documents,
and survey the scene. |
