Marinus Roelofse Van Vleckeren

The next person chronological order to whom the complete surname is ascribed is Marinus Roelofse Van Vleckeren, who dwelt in Bloomingdale, a village in the upper part of Manhattan Island to the west of Harlem. That he first preferred to use simply his patronymic, Roelofse, following a practice quite prevalent among the early settlers of New Amsterdam, is evidenced from the record of his children’s baptisms given below. His wife was Dina Idesse, a daughter of Theunis Idesse and Jannetie Thyssen, baptized January 22, 1679[i]. They were married on May 19, 1702, at the New York Dutch Church. The record as given in the Dutch language is:

Ingeschreven                                                                          Getouwt

1702

den 25 April    Marinus Roelofz met Dina Theunisze den 19 May

Eight children, baptized in the same church, are the recorded issue of this marriage (note that Dina sometimes used her patronymic, Theunisse, and sometimes Idesse as a surname):[ii]

This list illustrates the variety of spellings often found for the same name, a characteristic of these early Dutch records, and also the tenacity of the custom in those days to name children after their grandparents-Jannetje after the maternal grandmother and Teunis after the maternal grand father. Note, too, how the name of Teunis was given to three sons in succession, the earlier ones obviously having died in infancy. But the real importance of this list lies in the fact that it forms the connecting link between the New York Van Vleckeren records and those found later in Dutchess County, which will follow shortly.

These children, when grown to manhood and womanhood, are all recorded with the surname Van Vleckeren, not Roelofse. The first of them to be mentioned in the records is the oldest, the daughter Jannetje, whose marriage in the same Dutch Church reads as follows:

Ingeteekent                                                                                                                 Getrouwt

1724, May 16              Laurens Louw, j.m.V.Nieuw Haarlem & Jannetje Van   Juny 12

Vlekkeren, j.d. van Bloernendaal.

In Riker’s History of Harlem this same marriage is reported:

Lawrence Low m. on June 12, 1725, Jannetje, dr. of Marinus Roelols van Vleckeren

(whence Flackra and Flack) of Bloomingdale.[iii]

From this marriage two children are recorded: Dina, baptized on March, 111730, and Marinus, baptized April 28, 1734, both named after Jannetje’s parents.[iv]

The second marriage in this family recorded in the New York Dutch Church is that of the second child:

Ingeteekent                                                                                                     Getrouwt

1736, Jan. 31   Abraham van Vlekkeren j.m. v. N. York met Hilletje Buys,   Feb. 20

j.d. v. N. York.