Originally posted by MarkJerling Indeed. My great-great-great-great-grandfather worked for the VOC (The Dutch East India Co) from 11 September 1772 until 20 August 1776. He arrived at the Cape on 18 February 1773, on the ship Beemster Welvaren.
I'm not completely sure, but I may have some long lost Dutch ancestors who went by the name of Koeck ...or something like that. They were very early settlers of New York colony, but even before, when it was known as Nieuw Amsterdam. This would be in the 1600's, starting in the very early 1600's.
I believe they may have lived in the Sleepy Hollow area, which despite it's renown in literature, was a real area/town.
Founding and History of the New York Colony.
My wife just discovered this in the last month or so and over the next while, I'll be checking into it, more thoroughly...so a lot of things need to be followed up and confirmed, as I pore through old records.
Also over the past couple of years, we determined that some of my early English relatives who came over to the American colonies were English Puritans, who were commercial mariners , who had commercial ties in Holland. One of my ancestral grandparents, who was English, may have been born in Leyden, Holland, in the early 1600's.
Just shows to go, that you never know.