52W Mark IV – Week 19: Card K6 Cornelis Komen

Egad, this year’s 52 Ancestors Challenge  is already on Week 22, and here I am still trying to finish Week 19. I’ve never fallen this far behind in four years of participating in the challenge, but I’m not giving up. As they say, better late than never!

Cornelis Komen was born on September 2, 1812 in Zuid-Scharwoude, Noord Holland, Netherlands. He was the eldest child of Nicolaas Cornelisz “Klaas” Komen, a watermill worker, and Vrouwtje Hilbert Hilberts, who had been a domestic servant up until her marriage. Cornelis was the eldest of six children. While one of Cornelis’s siblings died in childhood, he and his other siblings lived long lives. He and a brother lived into their 80s, another brother lived until age 77.

Cornelis spent most of his life working as a farmer and day labourer in Noord Holland. While he moved several times throughout his life, he never lived much further than a few kilometers from where he was born. In the early 1830s, he worked as a farmer in Oterleek, which is a bit south of Heerhugowaard. By 1840, he was living and working in Heerhugowaard, which is a stone’s throw from Zuid-Scharwoude.

In February 1839, Cornelis married for the first time, to Marijtje Olijkan. Marijtje was born on May 9, 1815 in Opmeer. Cornelis and Marijtje’s marriage registration noted that both were farmers at the time. The marriage also occurred in Opmeer, almost nine kilometers from Heerhugowaard. Considering how Cornelis did not move very far afield* during his life, I don’t know how he came to be married to someone who lived so relatively far from the tiny domain that he inhabited.

Nevertheless, after the wedding Cornelis and Marijtje lived in Heerhugowaard. The couple had two children, both born in Heerhugowaard: Jan, born in 1839, and Trijntje, born in 1840. Sadly, Marijtje passed away on August 23, 1841, less than three weeks after giving birth. She was only 25. Trijntje died ten days after her mother, on September 3, 1840. Jan, on the other hand, lived to be 82.

Cornelis continued to live and work as a labourer in Heerhugowaard after he was widowed. Then, on May 2, 1851, over a decade after Marijtje’s death, Cornelis remarried. His second wife was Maartje Mettes, my Gx3 Grandmother, who was born in Hensbroek on December 25, 1817. Maartje was the daughter of Pieter Ariensz Mettes and Grietje Cornelis Poland. This was also Maartje’s second marriage. She had been previously married for ten years to Klaas Buur, with whom she had four sons. The eldest and the youngest of their children both passed away before Klaas died, in 1847.

By marrying Maartje Mettes, Cornelis Komen became the brother-in-law of…Cornelis Komen! Maartje’s older sister, Neeltje, was also married to a man named Cornelis Komen. The two Cornelises were first cousins once removed. There also may not have been much confusion between the names, because it appears that the other Cornelis more likely went by the variant “Crelis”.

For the first few years after their marriage, Cornelis and Maartje continued to live in Heerhugowaard, where they had two sons: Nicolaas “Klaas” (my Gx2 Grandfather born 1852) and Adrianus “Arie” (born 1853). Sometime shortly after Arie’s birth, the family moved to Zuid-Scharwoude, where Cornelis worked as a day labourer. In 1854 they were living in Pannekeet, on the outskirts of Zuid-Scharwoude, along with Maartje’s sons from her previous marriage and his sons with Maartje.

Cornelis and Maartje, along with Arie, were still living in Zuid-Scharwoude as late as the 1870s, where Cornelis continued to work as a labourer.  Cornelis and Maartje relocated to Heerhugowaard by the 1880s. By then, all their children were adults, but Maartje’s granddaughter, through the children she had with Klaas Buur, was living with Cornelis and Maartje.

The family was still in Heerhugowaard at the time Cornelis died, on November 13, 1893. He was survived by Maartje, who lived until 1896.

*All puns are intended. Intend your puns!