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Birth: 9 Jun 1625 Ft. Orange, Albany, New Amsterdam
Death: 1685 New York
Father: Joris (George) Jansen
RAPALJE (1604-1662)
Mother: Catalina TRICO (1605-1689)
Jean RAPALJE (~1492 - )
Jaques RAPALJE
(~1526 - )
Jean RAPALJE (~1552 - 23 Feb 1606) & Elizabeth BAUDOIN (~1560 - Feb 1606)
Joris
(George) Jansen RAPALJE (28 Apr 1604 - 21 Feb 1662) & Catalina TRICO (1605
- 11 Sep 1689)
Sarah Jorisen RAPALJE* (9 Jun 1625 -
1685) & Hans Hansen BERGEN ( - bef 30 May 1654)
Breckje Hansen BERGEN (7 Jul 1642 - ) & Aert Teunrssen MIDDAGH
(1634/1640 – 1687/1714)
Dirck Aertson MIDDAGH (23 Aug 1671 - 14 Sep 1710) & Catalyntje Van
NESTE (abt 1672-1757)
Judick
Jorisen RAPALJE (5 Jul 1635 - 21 May 1726) & Peter Pietersen VAN NESTE (abt
1630 - 1691)
Catalyntje Van NESTE** (abt 1672 - 11 Dec 1757) & Dirck Aertson
MIDDAGH (23 Aug 1671 - 1710)
Jacobje MIDDAGH (24 Oct
1693 - 16 May 1782) & Adrian (Aderyon?) ATEN (1695 - 1757)
John (Jan?) ATEN (22 Dec 1732 - 1790) & Elizabeth BADYN (1733 - )
Cornelius ATEN
(18 Jan 1766 - 21 Mar 1857) & Sarah (Sally) BELL (13 Feb 1770 - Jun 1856)
Aaron
Kimble ATEN (18 Feb 1812 - 9 Sep 1901) & Dorcas GLASS (1814 - 1892)
Ellen
Arminda ATEN (17 Dec 1849 - 6 Mar 1919) & Moody ROBINSON (1850 - 1938)
Adelia Gertrude ROBINSON (1878 - 1973) & Newton COFFEY (1875 - 1969)
Leo Newton COFFEY (1901 - 1998) & Elsie Maureen WALKER (1903 - 1983)
Misc. Notes
(Because of
file size, her husband Hans Hansen BERGEN is covered in a separate report.)
Name
Variations:
Sarah
(Sara?) Jorisen (Jorise? Jorissy?) Rapalje (Rapalye, Rapalie, Rappelyea,
Rapareillet, Raparlier)
An Historical Perspective
by Fred Coffey
Sarah
Jorisen Rapalje is not only the earliest of my ancestors to be born in the New
World, but she also lived in a time of great historical interest. We know little about her but dates and
places, but those dates and places reveal a great deal about her life.
Let us begin
with her parents. Her mother was
Cataline Trico, who is identified as being born in the Hainault section of what
is now Belgium in the year 1605.
Cataline's father was Joris Trico -- we know nothing else about her
family. In any case, Cataline was a
French-speaking Walloon, from a section of the Low Countries in Europe that was
subject variously to French, Spanish, Dutch and Austrian influence.
Sarah's
father was Joris Jansen Rapalje, and her grandfather was Jean Rapalje. We know neither birth dates nor places, but
it is probably safe to presume that they were also Protestant Walloons.
Let us now
put these people into their historical perspective.
1609 - Cataline,
Sarah's mother-to-be, is now 4 years old; and Henry Hudson, an Englishman under
contract to the Dutch East India Company, is seeking a northern route to the
Orient. In September his ship, 'The Half
Moon', explores the Hudson river north to the site of modern Albany, New York.
Also in this
year the Dutch, controlling the northern Low Countries of Europe, and the
Spanish, controlling the south, sign a truce.
Cataline's family is Protestant, but they live in the area under the
control of Catholic Spain (or perhaps under Catholic France -- depending on exactly
where they lived).
1621 - The truce
with Spain ends, and the Dutch West India Company is created.
1623 - The West
India Company begins operation, and organizes a colonial expedition to the area
of the Hudson River.
1624 - On
January 13, 1624, Joris Rapalje and Cataline Trico are married and immediately
join the West India Company expedition.
Perhaps they, as Protestants, could no longer cope with the Catholic
Spanish control of their home region?
In April
their ship, the 'Nieu Nederlandt' under the command of Cornelis Jacobsen May,
arrives off the Hudson River. There are
30 families (including the Rapalje family) aboard. Most are French-speaking Protestant Walloons.
Not sure about the ship name -- found another opinion from “dkoenig@library.berkeley.edu” saying: “Much has been written on the Rapalje family. The immigrant couple was Joris Janszen Rapalje and Catalyntje Jeronimus Trico. He was 19 years old, and she was 18 when their marriage intentions were recorded in Amsterdam on 13 Jan 1624. They were allowed to marry a week later -- 21 Jan 1624 -- without waiting an additional week for the third reading of the banns because their ship -- "de Eendracht" -- was about to sail for New Netherland. It was this voyage that was the first to bring permanent settlers to the new Dutch colony.”
Joris,
Cataline, and 17 other families are sent up the river to construct a log fort
at Fort Orange, near present-day Albany.
Three other groups spread out to other sites along the coast.
1625 - On June
9, 1625, Sarah Jorisen Rapalje was born at Fort Orange. (Many sources claim she
was the first white child to be born in New Netherlands.)
Several
supply and livestock ships arrived at the colony that year, along with 42 more
immigrants. During this year the colony
sends back 5295 beaver skins and 436 otter.
1626 - Peter
Minuit is the new Governor, and Manhattan is purchased from the Indians for 60
florins worth of merchandise. Sarah, now
one year old, moves back down river along with her parents and most of the
other families to settle in the new colony of "New Amsterdam."
1628 - Sarah is
3, and there are 270 people in the colony.
The West India Company decides to invest no more money in the colony,
but to go to a system of land-grants instead.
Life is hard, but New Amsterdam never suffered a "starving
time" like the British colonies at Jamestown and Plymouth did.
1635 - On July
5, 1635, Sarah's little sister, Judick, is born. There are other children in the family as
well (ultimately 10), but Judick is important because she is also our
ancestor. In about 60 years Judick's
daughter will marry Sarah's grandson (a marriage of "first cousins once
removed"). I note that such marriages among cousins were very common, both
for our family and most others in the 17th and 18th century.
In 1639 (1638 by one source) Sarah
(now about age 14) marries Hans Hansen Bergen, who is from Bergen, Norway and
whose occupation is apparently “ships carpenter”.
1640 - There are
now about 500 people living in the Colony.
The Colony has had a chronic problem attracting Dutch immigrants (life
is relatively good back home, so why move?).
A high proportion of the new immigrants have come from England, Norway
and Germany. Sarah’s first daughter, Anneke, is born.
1642 - Sarah is
now 17 years old, and has a second daughter, Breckje, who is our ancestor. One wonders what language they will learn
first, these daughters of a Norwegian father and a French Walloon mother living
in a Dutch colony.
The
communication problems were not unique to this family. In 1644 Father Isaac Joques reported that
"there may well be four or five hundred men of different sects and
nations; the Director General told me that there were persons there of eighteen
different languages."
1645 - Sarah is
now 20 years old, with a new son joining her two daughters. Peter Stuyvesant has been selected to be the
new Governor (although he will not actually arrive for 2 more years).
At this time
"New Amsterdam appeared a straggling village of some one thousand people
living in 150 to 200 houses. The church
remained unfinished, the fort was weak, and the muddy streets stank with
excrement from pigsties and privies.
Only the thirty-five taverns seem to have been flourishing. (We have one
report that Sarah’s father, Joris, was the proprietor of one of these taverns,
at least at some stage in his life.) The
hinterland consisted of perhaps fifty "bouweries" (Company farms) on
Manhattan, Long Island, and Pavonia (now Jersey City)".
1647 - Peter
Stuyvesant arrives, walking on his peg leg embroidered with silver bands (He
had lost his leg in an unsuccessful assault on a Spanish fort in the
Caribbean.)
1654 - On May
30, 1654, Hans Bergen dies. Sarah (age
29) is now a widow with 3 daughters and 4 sons, with ages ranging from 1 to 14.
1655 - What
should have been a trivial dispute in a peach orchard turns into the
"Peach War" with the Indians.
Fifty colonists and about 60 Indians are killed. One source indicated
that Sarah had a brother, Jacob, who would have been about 16 at this time, who
was reported “killed by indians” -- was it this battle?
Another
source (”New England: New York Ancestors Before 1850”, published by Seattle
Genealogical Society) indicates that Sarah remarried in this year, to “Tunis
Gysberse Bogaert”. There were seven children from this marriage, including
Gysbert Bogaert. After a slight change in spelling, he is an ancestor of
“Humphrey Bogart” (1899-1957) -- the famous movie star. Therefore my father Leo
Coffey and Humphrey Bogart are apparently half 8th cousins! There are also
descendants with the family name “Brokaw” -- are we all related to news caster
Tom Brokaw as well? (There are probably now several hundred thousand people in
the US who can claim Sarah as their ancestor -- it’s probably unlikely that Tom
will ever invite ALL his cousins over for dinner!)
1664 - Charles
II of England grants lands that include New Amsterdam to his brother, James
Duke of York. James sends four ships to
claim his new territory. On August 26
his ships, under the command of Colonel Richard Nicolls, anchor off Manhattan
and declare that the colony is now British.
Peter
Stuyvesant wants to fight, but the rest of the colonists have heard the British
terms and argue that they can live with them.
Stuyvesant yields, and on Monday, September 8, Sarah and her family
become British subjects. Colonel Nicolls
sends a message of victory from the colony of "New York."
At the time
of the British conquest Sarah would have been 39 years old with 14 children by
two husbands. Her mother, Cataline, was
also still alive. Sarah reportedly died in 1685, at about age 60. Cataline
lived to the age of 84, and died in 1689.
Historical
References
Kammen,
Michael, "Colonial New York - A History", Copyright 1975, Charles
Scribner's Sons, New York.
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1: Hans
Hansen BERGEN
Birth: Bergen,
Norway
Death: bef 30 May 1654 New Amsterdam
Father: Hans BERGEN (1600-)
Marriage: 9 Jun 1639 New Amsterdam
NOTE: See
separate biography for Hans BERGEN.
Hans Hansen BERGEN ( - bef 30 May 1654) & Sarah Jorisen
RAPALJE (9 Jun 1625 - 1685)
Anneke BERGEN (20
Jul 1640 - )
Breckje Hansen
BERGEN (7 Jul 1642 - ) & Aert Teunrssen MIDDAGH (1634 OR 1640 - 1687 or
1714)
Jan BERGEN (1644 -
1715)
Michael BERGEN
(1646 - )
Joris BERGEN (1649
- )
Maria (Marritje)
BERGEN (8 Oct 1651 - )
Jacob BERGEN (1653
- )
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2: Teunis
Gysbertsen BOGAERT
Birth: 1625 Death: 1699 Marriage: 1654
Teunis Gysbertsen BOGAERT (1625 - 1699) & Sarah Jorisen
RAPALJE (9 Jun 1625 - 1685)
Aertje BOGAERT (19
Dec 1655 - )
Catalyna BOGAERT
(16 Dec 1657 - )
Neeltje BOGAERT
(22 Feb 1659 - )
Aeltje BOGAERT (13
Nov 1661 - 1735)
Annetje BOGAERT
(23 Aug 1665 - )
Neeltje BOGAERT
(23 Aug 1665 - )
Gysbert BOGAERT
(1668 - ) & Jannetje Simonse VAN ARSDALEN (abt 1665 - Dec 1732)
Gijsbert
BOGAERT (abt 1697 - ) & Marretje BERGEN
Jacob
BOGAERT (1723 - ) & Ann STRYKER
Guisbert BOGAERT (1748 - 1779) & Metje BROKAW (1746 - )
Jacob BOGART (1772 - ) & Mary BROKAW (1776 - )
Peter Brokaw BOGART (10 Nov 1793 - ) & Agnes WELTY
Adam Welty BOGART (11 Nov 1829 - ) & Julia
Dr. Belmont De Forest
BOGART (1865 - ) & Maud HUMPHREY (1874 - 1914)
Humphrey
(The Actor) BOGART (23 Jan 1899 - 14 Jan 1957) & Lauren BACALL
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