Dutch Ancestors: August 2023

In June 2023, I had an opportunity to visit the Brooklyn Museum, to have a distant look at gravestones inside the Flatbush Dutch Reformed Church Cemetery, & to examine relocated Dutch graves at Cedar Dell in Greenwood Cemetery, Brooklyn. Which cemetery was also part of the site of the 1776 Battle of Brooklyn Heights. Flatbush was briefly a headquarters for the invading British, who had assembled the century’s largest armada & landing force to subdue the American colonies. The Dutch graves at Cedar Dell in Greenwood Cemetery contain some of my ancestral surnames, but these date from a century or more following my current interest in my kin of 1600s Long Island.

Brooklyn Museum has on display the house once owned by Jan Martense Schenck, my 8th great granduncle. And the house of his grandson Nicholas Schenck (1732-1810). Some years ago, the Jan Martense Schenck House was visited by Hans Zijlstra, who has a yDNA match with several male Schenck-surnamed descendants of Jan, & of his brother Roelof (my ancestor). The Schenck yDNA link with Hans & others is evidence of a link to Friesland & North Holland. Hans’ ancestral village is near a castle of Schenck Van Toutenburg; Hans wrote an article about this connection. I have met with Hans in Amsterdam.

The “Clan of Schenck” in the Friese Waddenzee yDNA Project has a couple of these yDNA kits: Hans’ kit & the kit of Ray, my Schenck cousin also descending from Roelof. A recent yDNA match with Ray is a descendant of Selick Skank (1817-1846) of Upstate NY. This match is at the 111 STR (Short Tandem Repeat) markers level at Family Tree DNA. To date, I have no information on any advanced DNA testing done on Schenck or related kin. E.g. the Big Y700 test of SNP (Single Nucleotide Polymorphism) & STR markers.

A separate line of Schenck from the south of the Netherlands is not yDNA kin to my group, but the two lines of Schenck intermarried, creating no doubt a complex autosomal DNA picture. At Cedar Dell in the Greenwood Cemetery is the grave of Maria Schenck, wife of Van Remsen. The inscription is hard to decipher. However, I believe that it is likely that she was a granddaughter of Johannes Schenck (1691-1729) & Maria Lott. This Johannes is alleged in some old histories to have been a cousin of our Roelof & Jan Martense Schenck brothers; the yDNA evidence says otherwise. This Maria Schenck (1743-1772) was reportedly the wife of Rem Aris Van Remsen (1743-1780) who reportedly had Rapalje ancestry, so he was my kin anyway.

There are several URLs pertaining to Jan Martense Schenck (b. 1631) & how his house came to be in the Brooklyn Museum, & furnished in styles typical of the period. A connection between my Schenck and the pirate William Kidd is reported, as is a mysterious Captain Schenck. Jan had several descendants whose Schenck-surname yDNA kits are inter-matching.

Jan Martense Schenck (b. 1631), Gary’s 8th great granduncle, married Jannetje Stephense Van Voorhees (Gary’s 8th great grandaunt). Their son Stephen Janse Schenck (1686-1767; m. Antje Claes Wyckoff) was the father of Nicholas Schenck (1732-1810; m. Willemtje Wyckoff, 1757) whose house is also on display in the Brooklyn Museum, 4th floor. See Wiki Tree “Schenck-1272” for a brief account of Nicholas.

At the time of the 1776 invasion of Long Island by the British & their Hessian allies, Nicholas Schenck & family may have been in the vicinity. The predecessor of the current Flatbush Dutch Reformed Church would have been in existence. And the graveyards contained several of my ancestors and kin. The cemetery also contains some non-Dutch graves, including Revolutionary War Patriots.

Battle Hill, now inside Greenwood Cemetery, lies northwest of Flatbush (= Midwout). The views from the top are spectacular. Little wonder that the British sought to control this vantage point, prior to their takeover of New York City. See David McCulloch’s work “1776”, which I heard on CD just prior to the Brooklyn trip (wedding of my grand-niece).

The Flatbush Cemetery holds the remains of several of my kin. Of particular interest are the grandparents of my 7th great grandmother Sarah Van Middleward (b. 1685; m. Jan Brokaw): Teunis Van Middleswaert & Femmentje “Phoebe” Seals; Teunis Gysbert Bogaert & Sarah Rapalje. Four of my 9th great-grandparents. Phoebe & Sarah were in-laws. I have reason to believe that I have an autosomal DNA trace from Phebe, whereby a chromosomal triangulation links multiple people who either were in my line of descent, or were ancestral to people with Vanover ancestry, via Phebe’s daughter Willempie. Willempie had to have been a daughter of Phebe in order for the observed atDNA matches to make sense.

Above-ground marble vaults at the Flatbush Cemetery reportedly include my Van Couwenhovens. The inscriptions have reportedly faded, so getting inside the locked cemetery would probably not have clarified this anyway.