Person:Steven Van Voorhees (2)

Arrived 15 Apr aboard de Bonte Koe, The Spotted Cow.

Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was born in 1600 at Hees, Drenthe, Netherlands. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees married Aeltje Wessels <p2590.htm> before 1633; 1st marriage Steven. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees married Willemtje Roelofs Seuberinge <p2020.htm> in 1649 at Hees, Drente, Netherlands. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees died on February 16, 1683/84 at Flatlands, Kings County, New York; A commemorative marker in what is now Brooklyn reads:"Steven Coerten, born 1600, migrated with his family in 1660 for the manor of Voor-hees, Province of Drenthe, the Netherlands, to the village of Amesfoort, now Flatlands, Long Island, and settled near this site. He served his church as Deacon and Elder, and the comunity as a magistrate, patentee in the Nicills Charter of 1667." Steven Coerts Van Voorhees died after 1702 at Probably, Flatlands, Kings County, New York. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was also known as Steven Koerten Van Voorhees. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was also known as Steven Coerten van Hees. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was also known as Steven Coerte Van Voorhees. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was renting from a Johan Struuck at a yearly rate of 28 mudden of Rye. [A mudden of land is the amount which can be sowed with one mud] about 4 bushels of grain. A skepel is the amount of land which can be wowed with a skepel [a bushel] on March 22, 1658. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees and Willemtje Roelofs Seuberinge <p2020.htm> immigrated in 1660 to New Amsterdam, New York County, New York; they sailed aboard the ship "De Bonte Koe" from Amsterdam Apr 15 1660. Captain Pieter Lucasz was master of the ship. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees imigrated on April 15, 1660 to New Amersfoort, Kings County, New York; The family travelled on Capt. Pieter Lucasz's ship "De Bonte Koe" [The Spotted Cow]. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees purchased from Cornelis Dicken Hoogland nine morgens of corn land, 7 morgens of woodland, 10 morgen of plain land, and 5 morgens of salt meadow in Flatlands with the house and a house plot in the village of Amersfoort en Bergen (Flatlands) with a brewery, grewing apparatus, kettle house, and casks with 3 appurtenances for 3,000 guilders on November 29, 1660. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees was appointed Magistrate in 1664. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees and Willemtje Roelofs Seuberinge <p2020.htm> were members of the DRC Flatbush, NY at Dutch Reformed Church, Flatbush, Kings County, New York, 1670. Steven Coerts Van Voorhees in 1675 at New Amersfoort, Kings County, New York.

Born about 1600 at the Farm of Voohees in the Province of Drenthe, the Netherlands Emigrated 1660 with second wife, children (except Marchien) and son-in-law Jan Kiers to Nieuw Amersfoort.

Came on ship Bontekoe "Spotted Cow" and purchased land from Cornelia Dirchsen Hoogland for 3000 Guilders. Will dated Aug 25, 1677.

The first Van Voorhees came to America in 1660.

1. ↑ ^1.0 1.1 Van Voorhis, Elias William. A genealogy of the Van Voorhees family in America: or The descendants of Stephen Coerte Van Voorhees of Holland and Flatlands, L.I. (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons:  The Knickerbocker Press, 1888)
   pg. 10.

   Steven Coerte Van Voorhees, b. , 1600, at Hees, Holland; d. Feb. 16, 1684, at Flatlands, L.I. m. 1st, in Holland, a wife, name unknown, who bore him all his children; m. 2d, prior to 1677, on Long Island, Willempie Roelofse Seubering, dau. of Roeloef Seubering, b. , 1619; d. , 1690.

2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Christoph, Florence A. Van Voorhees Family in America: The First Six Generations. (Baltimore, MD: Van Voorhees Association, 2000)
   p. 1.

   Steven Coerte Van Voorhees, born 1599 or 1600, at Hees, Drenthe, Netherlands; married first Aeltjen Wessels circa 1625; married second Willempie Roelofse Seubering from Zwiggelte, Drenthe, daughter of Roelof Seubering, circa 1649; died Feb. 16, 1684 at Flatlands, Kings Co., NY. [D.J. Wijmer ("Steven Coerts, His Family and His Dutch Background," in Through a Dutch Door, 20-23) thinks he is probably a son of Coert Alberts te Voorhees (d. ca. 1620), grandson of Albert Coerts (d. 1581), and great-grandson of Coert to Heess (d. 1544) and his wife Gese (d. 1537). See also Elias W. Van Voorhis, A Genealogy of the Van Voorhees Family in America, pg. 10; and Albert L. Stokes, The Van Voorhees Family, pg. 45. A biography of Steven Coert by Daniel Voorhis Grinnell can be found in "de Halve Maen," April-July 1966.]
   
   Drenthe was the most sparsely populated Dutch province, economically depressed but with rising taxes. Beginning in 1651, residents of rural southwest Drenthe began emigrating to New Netherland, where the largest town, New Amsterdam, was about the same in population as Drenthe's largest town of Meppel (ca. 1,200). Steven Coerte with his wife, children aged 22, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2, and son-in-law, Jan Kiers, sailed on the ship 'de Bonte Koe' (the Spotted Cow) 15 April 1660. They were not venturing into the unknown: already in New Netherland were his wife's brother Jan and her sister Lambertje, wife of Jan Strycker, and several relatives of Strycker. In fact there were 19 people from southwest Drenthe in New Netherland before the Bonte Coe brought 39 more. In 1662, another 23 arrived. By 1664 there were 108, most of them on western Long Island, others along the Hudson River Valley as far north as Fort Orange (Albany), and a few as far south as Delaware. [Passenger list in Holland Society "Yearbook," pg. 13. The New Netherlands Register, Vol. 1, Jan 1911, pg. 11 provides information on the Bonte Koe.]
   
   Steven Coerte at various times in Drenthe had rented farms in Ruinen, Hees, Oosterboer, and Meppel. He went from leasing a fouteen-acre farm at Voorhees to being a landowner, buying a farm in New Amersfort six months after his arrival in New Netherland. No penniless immigrant, he paid 3400 guilders. By 1675 he had 30 morgens (63 acres), 15 cattle, 4 horses and 2 hogs. He is listed on the assessment roll of Amersfort in 1676 and 1683 with 55 morgansof land. His son Coert had an even larger farm, as would the other sons in time. In short, life on the American frontier was probably better than in the Dutch back-country, with larger farms and higher wages. ["Documentary History of New York," Vol. 2, pg. 490 & 497, Vol. 4, pg. 155. F. Van Wyck, "Long Island Colonial Patents," lists Flatland patents and records of "Steven Coerten" and "Coert Stevens." Information in this section comes from three articles in "Through a Dutch Door," one by D.J. Wijmer, cited above, and two by J. Folkerts, "Drenthe and New Netherland, Two Outer Provinces at the Time of Emigration," and "Emigration from Drenthe to America in the 17th Century."]
   
   He and his wife were members of the Flatbush Ref. Ch. in 1677. He was sometimes listed as Steven Koert Van Voorhees. ["Misc. Records of Flatbush Ch.," pg. 43 Frost Collection at Brooklyn Historical Society.]

3.   http://www.vanvoorhees.org/