Week Two for the 2024 edition of the 52 Ancestors Challenge, and I’m already struggling. While my experience with the challenge has been rewarding and continues to be so, as I start my third year participating I am finding it harder to find things I haven’t previously written about one way or another. For this week’s prompt, “Origins”, it would have been quite easy to simply recycle any one of a number of past posts. However, I am trying to do something relatively new each week, because I think that’s most in keeping with the purpose and goal of the challenge.
Finally, today, now that Week Three’s prompt has been issued (on another recurring topic!), I thought I had finally come up with something I hadn’t written about before. Turns out that it’s something I’ve touched upon before. Nevertheless, I’m running with it because it’s never been the primary focus of a post.
My father was born in the Netherlands, so I have deep Dutch roots. My direct ancestors are primarily from the central part of what is now the province of Noord Holland, going back centuries. My paternal line has been there for 200 years but originated in Zuid Holland, in towns and villages between Den Haag (The Hague) and Leiden. Most of my Noord Holland ancestors were born, lived, and died roughly within a 280 square kilometre area.
However, several of my Noord Holland ancestors were from Den Helder, a city on the northern tip of the mainland of Noord Holland. It is an important port city. In the 16th and 17th centuries, it was a significant mustering and departure point for Dutch overseas trade and exploration. It is now the home of the Netherland’s main naval base.
Three kilometers north of Den Helder, across the Marsdiep strait, is the island of Texel. Through my father’s maternal grandmother, Elisabeth Bakker (1888-1976), I have significant roots in Texel. I do not know how far back those roots truly go, but I know that one branch of Elisabeth’s maternal line was on Texel by end of the 15th century.
In English, the “x” is pronounced the same as it is in “Texas”. In Dutch, it’s pronounced “Tessel”. Texel is the first and largest of the Wadden Sea islands, which stretch along the entire north coast of the Netherlands. Nine hundred years ago, Texel was part of the mainland. A catastrophic flood in 1170 dramatically changed the geography of north-west Netherlands, including the creation of the island of Texel. There has been settlement on Texel since at least the 12th century. Texel even has its own dialect, Tessels. It was common until the 1950s, after which time it went into significant decline.
The island received city rights in 1415. It has been the site of significant naval engagements over the last 400 years. It was also the site of one of the last battles of World War II in Europe. The island had been relatively unscathed during the war itself. It was only after the war was over that it was devastated. A German battalion made up of Georgian soldiers occupied Texel during the war. Supported by the Dutch Resistance, they rebelled in April 1945. Fighting between the Georgians and Germans lasted well beyond VE Day, ending only with the arrival of Canadian troops on May 20, 1945.
Historically, Texel’s primary economic activity involved agriculture and the sea. It is famous for a breed of sheep, Texels, that originated there. In present times, the island is primarily dependent on tourism. While most of my Dutch ancestors were primarily farmers and labourers, many of my Texel ancestors were sailors.
Both of Elisabeth Bakker’s grandfathers, Jan Cornelis Bakker (1819-1859) and Cornelis Ran (1824-1897), were harbour pilots. I suspect it was that line of work that led them to relocate and settle in Den Helder. Two of Elisabeth’s four great grandfathers, Cornelis Dirksz Bakker (1789-1858) and Reijer Ran (1792-1860), were also sailors. It was Elisabeth’s father, Cornelis Jan Bakker (1855-1914) who broke with that tradition. He was a cobbler and shoemaker.
One of Elisabeth’s great grandfathers who was not a sailor was Jan de Waard (1787-1863). He began his working life as a labourer but for the last twenty years of his life he was a shopkeeper. Jan is interesting because nearly all my paternal line were Roman Catholic, but Jan was baptised in the Reformed Church. However, his wife Cornelia Pieters Kooij was Catholic and their children were baptised as Catholics. It is possible that Jan might have converted.
The other interesting thing about Jan and Cornelia is that they were amongst the last to be married during the period of French rule during the Napoleonic wars. They married at Texel on October 10, 1813. The record of their marriage is written in Dutch, but bears the seal of Imperial France. Less than a month after their marriage, a popular uprising resulted in the ouster of the French. On November 30, 1813, the son of the former stadholder of the country returned from exile and was named William I, Sovereign Prince of the United Netherlands and subsequently King.
The other of Elizabeth’s great grandfathers who was not a sailor, Johannes Puinbroek (1786-1865), was not even from Texel. In fact, he is quite the oddity in my family tree. He was born so far south from Texel that the town where he was born, Vrasene, is in Belgium (which at the time was the Austrian Netherlands). Sometime around 1822 and 1824 Johannes relocated to Den Helder, where he met and married his third wife. I have no idea beyond speculation as to what prompted him to move. I thought I had written about him before, given his unusual story, but searching through my posts I found nothing. Well! There is something I haven’t written about before! Stay tuned…
A Deck of Ancestors 