Introduction to Blog and The Swain Family From Holland
April is a good a time of year to launch this blog about our family history.
I offer here my research into our long and fascinating comings and goings. You are invited to add to this page each bit of history you may come across in your own 'wonderings'.
I began with curiosity about Vince's father John Doak Calvert. I knew only that he was born in Northern Ireland in 1838 and by the end of the century was farming near Saverton, Missouri where Vince was born and raised. I had a photo of John and his wife taken in the latter part of the 1920's and knew that she was his second wife.
I wanted to know what Irish county John was born in and when he came to America. As it happens, at this writing, I still do not know the county, but I do know more about John and as I sought information about him, I uncovered much about the McGowans, Shrums and Swains that I had never dreamed. The Shrums in fact were completely unknown to me. The woman in the photo I have is Agnes Shrum, Vincent's mother and John's second wife. They married in 1887 one year after John's first wife, Emma, died. Agnes was only 17 and John 49. But the story of John and Agnes comes many generations after our family first arrived here so I will leave their story for later.
The Swains arrived in New Amsterdam in 1661.
Grace Estella Swain was Hattie McGowan Calvert's mother. My generation in the late fifties and early sixties remembers her as Grandma Great, an intimidating grand dame sitting by the oil stove in Hattie's parlor. She could easily be confused with Queen Victoria, at least by me. Her white hair was in a bun and when combed out was very long and ivoried from age. She rested her feet on a folk art footstool made of six Hi-C cans bound together with twine padded with newspaper and covered with quilted patches of velvet or corduroy.
Grandma Great had two rooms of her own in the little house on Gilbert Street. She had a parlor and a bedroom on the first floor that later became Hattie's. But when Grace had those rooms they could only be seen by children if said children peeked through the windows from the porch. And when I did so, I saw a very Victorian room filled with large plants and doily covered tables, dark furniture and objects of mystery. One such object was a straw pith helmet, exactly the kind the safari explorers wore inTarzan and Rama of the Jungle. In my estimation then Grandma Great must have been an explorer of such ilk. She'd have been to Africa at the very least. She was like the nineteenth century explorer ladies I saw in the huge, clumsy stereoptic viewers, sort of an early slide viewer, one could find at the library. Here the khaki-coulotted ladies wore identical pith helmets and climbed the Grand Canyon with stout walking sticks, visited Lake Victoria and took a donkey train to Kathmandu.
Now in truth, Grace had been a farmer's wife and a farmer's daughter and a farmer's grandaughter. She had as far as I know never left the country. This would surely have disappointed me greatly had I known. But the story I now know of the Swain family in America makes up for Grace's feet of clay.
It began with a man called Thys Barentsen from Leerdam, Netherlands.
Note: Thys Barentsen's name is a prime example of patronymics in that in translation it means he is "Thys", son of Barent, thus becoming "Thys Barentsen". The last name will also be found to be written as "Barentsz", the "sz" in Dutch meaning "son of". The name of Thys, Tys, ets., is Dutch for Matthew.It also has another meaning that is unknown at this time.Through the use of patronymics the name "Tysen-Tyson" came into being, i.e. Johannis Tysen, the Tysen having been carried forward by one branch of the family. It is apparent, in reading the 1706 Census of Staten Island, that the British, in requiring a surname, the family name of Swaim/Sweem was given and was written as "Swam" and in one instance as "Swain". (from Mullane -- bibliography to be published in later blog).
Thys arrived in New Amsterdam (now New York) in 1661 with his second or third wife, Scytie Cornelise, and their three children (one from Scytie) on the ship called De St. Jan Baptist . They were among the 18 families who formed the first permanent settlement on Staten Island, today one of the five boros of NYC. Earlier settlements had failed due to bad relations with the indigenous people there.
One battle between the Dutch and Indians was started when an Indian woman was shot for picking peaches from a Dutch farm. When the Indians said the Europeans could farm there, they did not have the same understanding of property ownership the Dutch had. They meant you are welcome to stay and eat. The first permanent Dutch settlement then was started by our ancestor Thys Barentsen and the others, and was in the general vicinity of South Beach, the town being called "Dover" on old English maps.
The island had decent farm land, much available sea food, especially oysters, many peach trees, fresh water, temperate weather, many trading partners, access to other Dutch families and the Dutch Reformed Churches, only a short boat ride away in Brooklyn, or a longer boat ride into New Amsterdam--Manhattan. After 30 years of living in New York city, I cannot describe how amazing it is to see those old Dutch churches and realize my family probably worshipped in them. I never thought anything in New York had the slightest bit to do with my own family apart from one or two ancestors landing at Castle Garden or Ellis island. But to discover that our family had quite a lot to do with the founding of New York just astounds me.
Thys Barentsen Sweem built up sizable land holdings He was appointed to positions of importance on the island such as land surveyor and tax collector. After the family had been on Staten Island only a couple of years, the British invaded and New Netherlands became a British colony. The Dutch and their culture were still hugely influential however and the Swaims continued to prosper.
For your own study, a great book on the Dutch in the new world at this time is The Island at the Center of the World. As time permits, I will publish to the blog scanned images of original documentation. But for today, I will leave you with the image above of a Dutch ship like the one the Barentsens sailed on to the New World. And below is the reproduction of the our first American ancestor's belongings at his death thirty years after arriving from Holland.
"An inventory of the Estate to which was found in the House of Tys Barenson taken Dec 2d 1682 being soon after his Decease.
Two working mares = 400 Guilders
Two working horses = 400 Guilders
Two young mares = 200 Guilders
Three Cowes = 450 Guilders
One young Ox two years old = 080 Guilders
The Moyety of a young ox 4 years old = 080 Guilders
Two Heifers two years old = 140 Guilders
One & a halfe of this yeares Calfe = 045 Guilders
Twenty Hoggs of two yeares old = 600 Guilders
One Pewter Dish, six plates
One pint, one Perrenger, on Chamberpot = 044 Guilders
Seven Earthen Platters, great and small = 020 Guilders
Four Iron Pots, Great and Little = 050 Guilders
On pair of Pott Hangers one Grid Iron
a trevet, a pair of Tongs a Boxen
smoothing Iron = 040 Guilders
Two ploughs, one Iron Chair with the Furniture = 230 Guilders
Two Axes, four Iron wedges, two little Hatchers = 42 Guilders
3 Howes, 1 stubbing How, 1 Spade = 38 Guilders
verte=2871 Guilders
One Chest, tenn Chaires, one Table, one Cupboard, two Bailes of Chern, nine Wooden Dishes, on Milk Fat, three Halfe Barrels and 1/2 three Sawes, one great Saw, a hand saw, 2 Beetle Rings, 2 slices = 0091 Guilders
Three Iron Forkes = 0009 Guilders
Two Spinning Wheeles = 0012 Guilders
Six Cover Letts for very Ordinary Bedding = 0120 Guilders
A canoe a Net with a Drawing Knife and Augur = 0031 Guilders
The Land with the House Barn and Plantacon = 8000 Guilders.
Was signed a True Copy translated out of French p me Fra-Williamson Cler, Cur Recorded by order of the Cort - Peter Smith, Clerk"
[from Kings County Court and Road Records, 1668 - 1766 p 188]
Roz Calvert
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