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- After coming here he was occasionally referred to in the Dutch records as van Boskerck. As he came from Holstein, where the Lutheran was the State Church, and the German language was prevalent, we would have expected this designation to have been given a German form, as von Buschkirk, but as a matter of fact, even in the German Evangelical Church records, it always appears as in the Dutch, van Bosckerk, later van Buskirk, pronounced Booskirk. The Philadelphia branch of the family adopted the last-mentioned form nearly two hundred years ago, and ever since have been known as Van Booskirk...The etymology of the Dutch name indicates a reference to a Wood or Woods-Church, Bosch-Kerk, or Church-in-the-Wood or Church-in- the-Bush, rather than in the forest. Bosch-Kapelle, or Woods-Chapel is the name of a village of 1,000 inhabitants in Zeeland, Holland. No account has been found of any town or village in Holland called Bosch-Kerk. In the German Church records no attempt has been made to translate the name into the German, Bursh-Kirche, or Wald-Kirche, but it has been transferred bodily from the Dutch, as above, indicating that it was already regarded as a proper name. [Proceedings of the New Jersey Historical Society, Vol. III, p. 160] - http://www.rogerbissell.com/id21ddd.html
Laurens Andriessen came from Holstein, Denmark in 1655. His name first appears in records of New Amsterdam, June 19, 1656 in a deed for a lot of land on Broad Street. He was then unmarried and a turner by trade, afterwards, however, becoming a draper. He took the oath of allegiance November 20, 1665 and married September 12, 1658 Jannetje Jans (widow of Christian Barentsen Van Horn)
In July 1658 Laurens was sent by the Orphans Master at New Amsterdam to South River (Delaware) to assist the widow of Christian Barentsen Van Horn, a carpenter, who died as the result of a malady that took many lives in that area. Four and a half months later Laurens and Jannetje married on December 12, 1658 according to the marriage registry of the Dutch Reformed Church in New Amsterdam. Some say the same date but list Old Dutch Church, Staten Island, NY.
Arrived in New Netherland before 1654, via Holland. Bought a lot on Broad St. 29 Jun 1656. Was a dry goods merchant. Moved to Hackensack by 1688. 1662, bought land on the shore of the Hudson. Became a judge and Justice of the Peace. Helped set up a Lutheran Church when the English established religious freedom. He was called van Buskirk because he lived next to a church by the woods. He was sometimes called Laurens de Dreyer (turner) because he was also apparently a turner by trade. (Source: Immigration Library, Scandinavian Immigrants of New York.)
Laurens Andriessen Van Buskirk was born in 1630 at Holstein, Denmark; now Germany. He married Jannetje Jans on 12 Dec 1659 at Dutch Reformed Church, New Amsterdam, New York County, New York. Laurens Andriessen Van Buskirk died on 13-Jul-1694 at Hackensack, Bergen County, New Jersey. He was buried after 13 Jul-1694 at Constable Hook, Bergen County, New Jersey. - Title: Shoemaker, Irene English; Van Buskirk, A Legacy from New Amsterdam.
In 1658, he married Jannetje Jans, the widow of Christian Barentsen Van Horn at the Dutch Church on Staten Island. Laurens acquired a sizable fortune through this union, as well as, four healthy stepsons.
Shortly after the establishment of Bergen (Jersey City), he purchased 170 acres in the nearby settlement of Minkakwa, again from Claus Carstensen. Minkakwa was located in the Greenville section of present day Jersey City, an area along the west bank of the Hudson, which is presently the Conrail railyard. This land was purchased in 1662, and it is probable that he moved there almost immediately, for in that same year, he was one of the petitioners for a clergyman to be installed at the Bergen settlement. In this petition, each petitioner pledged a yearly sum that they were willing to pay to the clergyman to constitute his salary. Louerens Andries, as his name is signed on the document, was not able to commit to a specific amount, declaring that he would donate an amount at his own discretion. This indicates that he was not as well off at this time as some of the other signers. He was willing to donate to the yearly salary for a clergyman, but he was not wealthy enough to commit to a number. Depending on how successful he was in a given year, would determine how much he could afford to spare.
Laurens also purchased lands on Bergen Neck. This included a large tract of Constable Hook, a portion of present day Bayonne. His son, Peter, built a house here in the late 1600’s, which stood, with alterations, until 1910, when it was torn down to make room for an oil company which had purchased the land.
In 1664, Laurens was appointed to a committee which petitioned Peter Stuyvesant and his Council for the authorization to construct blockhouses at each of the entrances to the settlement of Bergen. This was, no doubt, prompted by the Indian uprising which had recently occurred at Wildwick (Kingston), New York and Niew Dorp (Hurley), New York, coupled with a double murder closer to home. On the 18th of October, in the previous year, two “Christians” had been killed by Indians, while on their way from the village of Gamonepa (Jersey City - near the Morris Canal Basin) to Bergen. Though this turned out to be an independent and isolated incident, the colonists had no way of knowing this at the time. The Director General and his Council gave their consent to the petition, and the blockhouses were built under the direction of the committee.
In the latter part of 1664, the British took over the New Netherlands colony with the arrival of Colonel Nicolls and a fleet of four warships. The Dutch surrendered without a fight. Laurens, as did the rest, took the oath of allegiance to the British Crown and continued business as usual. In 1670, he was by act, appointed as “Recorder and Marker” for Minkakwa, empowered to assure all horses and cattle were properly marked. Six years later, he was made “Marker General” and “Ranger” for the town of Bergen, empowered to deputize at his discretion, individuals to roam the local woodlands to round up stray domestic animals.
In 1671, he was appointed by Governor Carteret, to his Council, the upper house of the proprietary government. This commission usually went to men of means and to those who showed marked loyalty to the royal government.
On February 16, 1677, Laurens was commissioned a member of the Bergen Court. Three years later he was made President of the Court. He also served as Bergen’s first Coroner, as Justice of the Peace, and Judge to the Court of Common Right at various times during his life.
In 1676, he purchased, with others, a large tract of land located between Overpeck Creek and the Hackensack River, known then as New Hackensack. To this land he moved as early as 1688. Here, he lived till the end of his life, in 1694. He and his wife were buried on the land he had purchased on Constables Hook, in the family cemetery. - ancestry.com unknown author
There is some controversy over the actual nature of Laurens' trade. The first mention of him in the records of New Amsterdam refers to him as Laurens de Draijer which, Nelson says, is Dutch for: the turner. As Nelson puts it:
The Dutch word for "turner" is draijer -- drawer, probably referring to the early use of the draw-knife in shaping vessels, shoes and other articles from wood...In many translations from the Dutch records, this designation of his occupation has been simply transferred to the English without interpretation, and as the name is thus entered also in the indices, the searcher for references to Laurens van Boskerck may easily overlook such allusion. [Proceedings, Vol. III, p. 161]
Laurens brought with him to America a Dutch assistant named Frederick Arenta Bloem, whom he hired in Amsterdam in 1654 and who, in order to get married, broke his contract with Laurens while it still had a year to run. As Laurens complained in court, while trying to force Bloem to work out the rest of the contract, he just "ran away from him last Sunday morning without words or reason." Nelson surmises from all of this the following:
Laurens Andriessen, having acquired in Holstein the art and mastery of the trade of turner, went up to Amsterdam, there to follow his vocation in turning wooden bowls and dishes and eke shoes for the thrifty Dutch Huysvrouwen of that fair city, finally setting up for himself and having an assistant, in the person of the inconstant Frederick Arentsen. With dreams of increasing his business and so bettering their fortunes, he turned himself westward from Old Amsterdam to Nieuw Amsterdam, where he speedily acquired such fame for the excellence of his work that he was commonly known by way of preeminence as de Draijer -- the Turner, of the little town. [Proceedings, Vol. III, pp. 163-4]
Nelson also takes aim at what he says is a misconception, based on a supposed error in reading early records, namely, that Laurens changed his occupation to draper, i.e., a dealer in cloth and dry goods. As Nelson points out, "in a thinly settled neighborhood where every family spun its own wool and wore its own cloth!," that would have made no sense at all. [Proceedings, Vol. III, p. 164]
Nevertheless, Mrs. Shoemaker cites a study of the earliest Danes in America, done some years ago for the Danish government by a Professor P. S. Vig, in which the claim is made that Laurens "established himself in the dry goods business in New Amsterdam and also bought some land etc." She bolsters Professor Vig's claim by referring to several records that mentioned Laurens as "de Draper."
Mrs. Shoemaker also says that a native Holland teacher of Dutch, French, and German claims there is not any such word as Draijer. Instead, according to this unnamed authority, a maker of wooden articles is called a "houtwerker" in Dutch. (Van Buskirk Legacy, p. 1) It probably remains for an expert, unbiased linguist to settle this issue.
New Amsterdam records make no mention of our ancestor from November 1656 to December 1658, when he wedded Jannetje (Janica) Jans, the widow of Christian Barents Van Horn. There was some speculation that Laurens had been with or near the Van Horns during their ill-fated attempt to settle on the Delaware River. Also, coincidental or not, Jannetje petitioned the Orphan Masters to settle her deceased husband's estate on December 12, 1658, the same day as her marriage to our Laurens, which took place at the Reformed Dutch Church of New Amsterdam. (Was this a dowry?)
The Vice Director of the Colony, Jacob Alrichs, sent notice of Christian's death to the Orphan Masters at New Amsterdam, along with an inventory of the estate and a request that Christian's widow be assisted. As Nelson described it, in rather droll fashion: The requisite "assistance," it will be observed, was promptly furnished by our friend Laurens Andriessen, who married the fair and not inconsolable young widow four and a half months after her sad bereavement. [Proceedings, Vol. III, p. 167]
By 1662, Laurens and his family moved across the Hudson River to what would later become Bergen County, New Jersey. They lived in a house on the shore of New York Bay. Laurens was very active in civic affairs, serving as a Juror, a Judge of the Court of Common Right, a Justice of the Peace, the county Coroner, and a member of the governor's Council, which was the upper branch of the Provincial Legislature. - http://www.rogerbissell.com/id21ddd.html
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Abt 1630 - 1694 (~ 64 years)
