52W Mark II – Week 11: Lucky

I’ve already written about the two luckiest genealogical breaks I’ve had: meeting Nol van den Hurk on an online forum, resulting in the foundation of much of my Dutch family history research; and using a random farm driveway in the middle of nowhere to turn around, thus stumbling upon and meeting a cousin in time to contribute to a family history book project. So it took a bit of thinking to come up with something new for this week’s them of “Lucky” for the 52 Ancestors Challenge.

When most people hear the word “luck” or “lucky”, the assumption is usually good luck. I started off with that premise in mind, only to discover that the example I came up with involves both good and bad luck.

Sometime in the early 1860s, Pieter Jansz van der Fluit, my first cousin four times removed, relocated from Oude Niedorp to Eierland. Oude Niedorp is in the centre of West Friesland (which is actually in the province of Noord Holland). Eierland (“Egg Land”), is located at the northernmost tip of Texel, the largest of the Wadden Sea Islands (or Frisian Islands), which stretch from the western Netherlands to Denmark. Until the 13th century, Eierland was part of the neighbouring island of Vlieland, when natural changes separated the two. In the 1600s, a sandbar developed between Eierland and Texel, which was dammed, merging the two. In the 1840s, developers enlarged this area to create a polder, resulting in new farmland.

I first learned about Pieter in August 1997, in an email from Nol summarizing many birth, marriage, and death registrations. In that email, he wrote that one of the records described Pieter’s occupation as “Farm”, as opposed to “Farmer”, suggesting that he owned his farm in Eierland. In the decades that followed, these archival records have been scanned and posted online. However, the only records I’ve found for Pieter say that he was a “farmer”.

The farm was later taken over by Pieter’s son Johannes Pietersz (“Jan”) van der Fluit. In an a September 1998 email to me, Nol reported that Pieter’s occupation was “farmer on Texel”, at Eierland. Nol added that the farm was named Het Fortuin (“The Fortune”). However, it seems that good fortune was not with Jan, as Nol said that Jan went broke. Nol told me that Jan was 75 Guilders short to pay an unspecified debt. Nol said that this was about the price of three sheep. I don’t know if Jan farmed sheep, but Texel is famous for a breed of sheep developed there. After going broke, Jan relocated to Amsterdam and became a police officer.

I’ve found records showing Pieter and Jan farming at Eierland and Jan relocating to Amsterdam and becoming a police officer. Good luck! Unfortunately, I have been unable to find any of the sources Nol might have been looking at confirming that the farm was named Het Fortuin or Jan’s financial woes. Bad luck.

“Het Fortuin” was also the name of a ship that sailed from Texel in September 1723, bound for Indonesia. It was the ship’s maiden voyage. It reached the Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) in January 1724. The ship and its crew of 225 men set sail two weeks later and was never seen again. Not very good luck at all.