I shouldn’t have to tell you that this isn’t really a picture of Trijntje Stoop (1832-1906)
I feel like this post could be a bit of a disservice or letdown to my Great x3 Grandmother, Trijntje Stoop. In many ways, I’ve exhausted a lot of what I could say about her through previous posts, such as Week 37 of the 2023 52 Ancestors Challenge (“Prosperity”) and last week’s post about her husband, Jan Gerritsz Veldman. What else can I say that I haven’t said already?
To that end, I have a fun fact about Trijntje. Her sister-in-law was also named Trijntje Stoop! The other Trijntje was married to Jan’s oldest brother, Pieter Veldman. There was an almost 20-year between Pieter and Jan; likewise, there was a 15-year age gap between the two Trijntjes. I’ve done a bit of digging to see if and how the Trijntjes might be connected, but nothing definite yet. In fact, you might think Trijntje Stoop might not be a common name. On the contrary, I’ve found quite a few!
Taking a step back to the beginning, Trijntje was born on October 30, 1832, in Barsingerhorn, Noord Holland. She was the first daughter and second of seven children born to Jan Pietersz Stoop and Elizabeth de Groot.
Schager Courant, November 18, 1906, page 4. “Bericht van Inzet” (“Notice of Commitment”), regarding the sale of Jan and Trijntje’s property after she died.
I have not yet found any records regarding Trijntje from the time of her birth to the time she married Jan Gerritsz Veldman on May 1, 1858. Their marriage registration says that Trijntje did not have an occupation at the time of their marriage. Given that she did not marry until she was 25 years old it is quite possible that Trijntje had worked in some form or another, such as a farm worker or a house servant.
While much of Trijntje’s life story is intertwined with her husband’s, after Jan died in 1897, she spent the next ten years of her life as the owner and operator of their farm. Trijntje died on January 27, 1906 in Barsingerhoorn.
“Burgerlijke Stand” – Civil Register. Notices of births, engagements, marriages, and deaths for Oterleek and Barsingerhorn, with Trijnte’s death noted at the bottom. Alkmaarsche Courant, February 8, 1906, page 4.
I have photos of thirteen of my sixteen great great grandparents. Maartje Veldman (1862-1904) is one of three for whom I don’t.
Maartje Veldman was the mother of Johannis Albertus van der Fluit and my father’s great grandmother. She was also the second wife of Jan Dirksz van der Fluit. Maartje was born on December 22, 1862 in Nieuwe Niedorp, Noord Holland, the third child of Jan Veldman and Trintje Stoop.
Like many unmarried Dutch women of her social status, and several of my other female ancestors, Maartje worked as a dienstbode (domestic servant) before she was married. Fortunately for genealogists, many gemeenten (plural of gemeente, a form of municipality usually comprised of several communities) kept a Dienstboderegister as part of their Burgerlijke Standregisters (Civil Registration Registers). This was due, in part, because many domestic servants lived with the families they served.
What caught my eye about Maartje’s registration is that she started work as a domestic servant much younger than my other ancestors. She was 14 years old when she began her first job on June 7, 1877. Her family was resident in Barsingerhorn, but her work was for a family that lived about 7.5 kilometers south, in Oude Niedorp. Maartje remained with that family until February 5, 1879, a couple months after she turned 16.
Another thing that caught my eye was that two weeks before Maartje left Oude Niedorp, her older sister Elizabeth (1861-1935), moved to Oude Niedorp to work as a domestic servant. Elizabeth is directly below Maartje in the Dienstboderegister. Elizabeth was 17 years old at the time. Elizabeth remained there until January 23, 1882, when she returned home to Barsingerhorn. Elizabeth married her first husband, Arie Zut, three months later, on April 21, 1882.
Maartje and Elizabeth in the Oude Niedorp Dienstboderegister (Servant Register) 1860-1889.
I haven’t found any indication that Elizabeth had worked as a domestic servant prior to this posting. What seemed odd is that the younger sister left home for work before the elder sister.
Coming and going. The top line is Maartje, the one below is Elizabeth.
There was no rest for Maartje when she left Oude Niedorp and returned home to Barsingerhorn. She immediately began work for a new family that was also resident in Barsingerhorn, which meant that Maartje was able to live at home with her parents during this job.
The Dienstboderegister does not indicate how long Maartje worked as a domestic servant in Barsingerhorn. All I know is that she was no longer working when she married Jan.
Top of the entry for the registration of Jan and Maartje’s marriage.
Jan and Maartje had seven children together, but the first two died shortly after birth. The rest survived to adulthood and married. The youngest child, a daughter named Brigettha Maria, was born on July 4, 1904. Maartje died one month later, on August 5, 1904, in Oude Niedorp. She was 41 years old. While I do not have a cause of death, I cannot help but wonder if it had been related to childbirth.
The signatures of Jan, Maartje, and the witnesses on the marriage registration.
UPDATE!
February 15, 2025: Eureka, I’ve found a photo of Maartje!
This week’s theme for the 52 Ancestors Challenge is “Prosperity”. While for the most part my ancestors over the centuries were largely working class and labourers, I have some that might have been described as “comfortable”. Thinking about it, the only ancestors who I might describe as “prosperous” are largely on the maternal branch of my family tree.
Despite this, the couple that come to mind for this week’s challenge are my Gx3 Grandparents on my father’s side of the family, Jan Gerritsz Veldman and Trijntje Stoop. I think of them primarily because of the amount of time I spent translating a pair of newspaper items describing their estate. Not only was it somewhat difficult because the items were written in an older form of Dutch, but because there was more to interpret than just the foreign language. In particular, the values were reported in guilders, the Dutch currency prior to the introduction of the euro; as well, the land was measured in terms that were not immediately familiar.
Schager Courant, Schagen, Noord Holland, Netherlands, November 11, 1906, page 4. “Openbare Verkooping” (“Public Sale”). This is an itemized list of the two pieces of property, consisting of 20 and 2 lots respectively, that went up for public auction after Trijntje died.
Trijntje was born October 30, 1832 in Haringhuizen, Noord Holland, Netherlands. Jan was born November 27, 1835 in Nieuwe Niedorp, Noord Holland, Netherlands. The two villages are about five kilometers apart. They married in Nieuwe Niedorp on May 1, 1858. They were living in Nieuwe Niedorp as late as 1866, when their fifth child was born. However, by 1873, they were living in Barsingerhorn, Noord Holland, Netherlands, where their tenth and last child was born. Barsingerhorn and Haringhuizen are relatively close to each other, situated about a kilometer and a half apart.
Jan died on May 21, 1897 while Trijntje passed away on January 27, 1906. The couple owned two pieces of property which Trijntje still possessed at the time of her death. One was a house comprised of two lots in Oude Niedorp, Noord Holland, Netherlands, together measuring 15.7 ares (just under 0.4 acres). [“Are” = 100 square meters. 100 Ares = 1 hectare. 1 hectare is just under 2.5 acres.] The other was a farm consisting of 2o lots in Barsingerhorn, which included a farmhouse, pastures, farmland, and a boat, totalling 11.9 hectares (just under 3o acres).
Map of the Netherlands with the province of Noord-Holland in red. The inset shows where Jan and Trijntje lived and owned property. I’ve circled Waarland because that is where my father was born. He did not live far from where his great great grandparents lived.
Schager Courant, Schagen, Noord Holland, Netherlands, November 18, 1906, page 4. “Bericht van Inzet” (“Notice of Commitment”).
According to both articles, the auction was scheduled to begin on November 13, 1906, although the second indicated that it was to have remained open until November 20, 1906. The second article set out the proposed value of each lot. Lots 1 to 20, the Barsingerhorn farm, had a total proposed value of ƒ17,152.66. Lots 21 and 22, the house in Oude Niedorp, were ƒ835.
By my calculations, these currently amount to €269,971.80 and €13,142.87 respectively, for a total of €283,114.67. (CDN$389,369.30 and CDN$18,955.42. Total: $408,324.72.) That might seem like a lot, but that’s barely enough to get a 500 square foot (0.01 acre) one bedroom condo apartment in Vancouver.
Approximate size of total land on offer: 24 American football fields (FYI, Canadian football fields are longer.)
A Deck of Ancestors 