Reviewing the Unplaced Genetic Descendants of Jan Brouwer of Flatlands, L. I. Revisited (Part II)

 This post continues the series beginning with the previous post of March 19, 2022. 

Before moving on to review the individual unplaced Earliest Known Ancestors (EKAs) of participants in the Brewer DNA Project who are known, by results of Y-DNA testing, to be somehow descended from Jan Brouwer, I thought it best to review and summarize the known descendants of Jan Brouwer through his sons, grandsons and great-grandsons. Most of those who cannot find the link between their EKA and Jan Brouwer, will most likely find it among Jan's male descendants found in the third and fourth generations (the grandsons and great-grandsons). The summary is provided as a PDF accessible with this link. I will further note that many of those found in the third and fourth generation remain open ended. That is to say, no record of their death or burial, nor an account of the settlement of an estate, has been found for them at the last known place where they lived. While their deaths and estates may have simply not been recorded, it is also possible that they moved on and such records are yet to be discovered, somewhere else. A number of others are known only from the record of their baptism. No record of these individuals as adults has yet to be identified. That does not mean that none exist. And it does not mean that the individual died before reaching adulthood. It may well mean that either additional records have not yet been found, or that known records simply have not been attributed to any one individual in question. So, using this summary as a starting point, keep searching. 

We will get to reviewing the unplaced EKAs who were discussed in a summary from 2015 in the next post of this series. I suspect that there will be two or three more posts. For the remainder of this post I just want to review the migration routes found for the descendants of Jan Brouwer, so lets get right into that.

Jan Brouwer lived at Flatlands on Long Island which, once counties were established, was in Kings County. Flatlands was also known, by the Dutch, as Amersfoort. It was located on the southeast shore of Long Island with the town of Gravesend (Kings Co.) to the west, and the town of Hempstead (Queens Co.) to the east. Today, Flatlands is a neighborhood in the Borough of Brooklyn, one of the five boroughs of New York City. Probate settlements from Jan's time are usually found in the Probate Books held at the Surrogate's Court of New York County, although a few can be found withing the Deed Books of Kings County*. Jan's son Pieter Brouwer also lived at Flatlands. Jan's son Derck appears to have lived for a time at Flushing and perhaps Jamaica, both in Queens County and closer to the north shore of Long Island. Jan's son Hendrick (no children) lived at Hempstead. Jan's son Johannes/Jan lived for a time at Gravesend and at Jamaica, but was of Hempstead when he wrote his will in 1712. The second generation, Jan's sons, did not venture far.

We start to see movement away from the south shore of Long Island with the third generation. The first baptism of the Freehold and Middletown Dutch Congregations was recorded in 1709. Services were held in the area as early as 1699. During the second decade of the 1700s, Annetje Jans Bergen, the widow of Jan's son Pieter Brouwer, moved to Middletown, Monmouth County, New Jersey with at least some of her children including sons Jan/John (no.4 in the summary) and Hans (no.5), and daughter Lucretia (m. Johannes Luyster). Jan, Hans, and Lucretia, all had children baptized by the Reformed Dutch Congregations of Freehold and Middletown during the decade of the 1720s and into the early 1730s. During the decades of the 1720s and 1730 we can place a few of Jan Brouwer's grandchildren at Middletown, Monmouth County, New Jersey. Descendants continued to be found in Monmouth County through the 1700s, 1800s and into the 1900s.

Jan Brouwer's other grandson named Jan (no.7) son of Derck Brouwer and Hannah Daws, had his own first child baptized at Jamaica, Queens County, Long Island in 1726. However, in 1729 he was in Somerset County, New Jersey where son Dirck was baptized at Raritan in that year. In 1732, when he wrote his will, Jan (calling himself John Brewer) was of Somerset County. Both Jan/John and his wife Aegje Sprong died at relatively young ages, leaving minor children who moved back to Long Island and lived at Hempstead with their great-uncle Hendrick Brower/Brewer. These children established what might be called the Hempstead branch of Jan Brouwer's descendants. They and their descendants largely remained in the Town of Hempstead, for a time during the period of the American Revolution known as South Hempstead, for the remainder of the 1700s, the 1800s and into the 1900s. 

Migration into the area of Somerset and Hunterdon Counties, New Jersey was by the Raritan River whose mouth is at Raritan Bay on the Atlantic coast, adjacent to Monmouth County and Staten Island, New York. The church at Raritan was organized March 9, 1699. The presence of Jan Brouwer's descendants in Somerset County, New Jersey appears to start about 1729 when the baptism of Jan Brouwer's (no.7) son Dirck is found at Raritan. We then see baptisms at Raritan, Harlingen (both in Somerset County) and Readington (Hunterdon County) through the 1730s and 1740s. Other than Jan's (no.7) will, no probate records have been found in Somerset or Hunterdon Counties during the colonial period. Generally speaking, migration of families from the Somerset/Hunterdon County area of New Jersey was westward, into Pennsylvania, particularly along the more southerly areas of the state that would later form the boundary with Maryland and Virginia. This would also include the areas of Frederick Co., Virginia and Berkeley Co., West Virginia. Men from Hunterdon County were in Frederick County by 1745. Jan Joostsz Van Meteran, as John Van Meter, had his will proved 3 September 1745 in Frederick County. His brother Isaac, as "Isaac Vanmetre of South Branch on the potowmack in Frederick County," wrote is will there 15 Feb 1754. Jan and Isaac's family was earlier found at Kingston, Ulster Co., New York. They were in Somerset County by 1706 when Jan's first child, daughter Sarah was baptized at Raritan. The Van Meter brothers were purchasers of large tracts in Frederick County. No doubt other Somerset/Hunterdon County area "Dutch" families followed them there. We know that a John Brewer, son of a Richard Brewer (see no.21) was in Frederick County by the time of the American Revolution. John's brother Samuel is said to have been born in Lancaster Co., Pennsylvania. Lancaster County is in the southeastern part of the state, but at the time Samuel and John were born it was a much larger county than it is today**. Generally speaking migration from the southern PA, northern VA region continued westward just prior to, during and in the years after the American Revolution, into southwestern Pennsylvania (Fayette, Washington, Westmoreland Counties) and what is now West Virginia (Monongalia County), and soon afterward along the Ohio River into eastern and northern Kentucky, southern Ohio, Indiana and eventually Illinois.

We first see a migration from the Somerset/Hunterdon County area to Albany County, New York in the early 1770s, on the eve of the American Revolutionary War. Elias Brouwer (no.23) has son David baptized at Schagticoke in 1773. Elias (no.23) himself was baptized at Readington in 1740. Abraham Brouwer/Brewer (no.25) himself baptized at Readington in 1734, is on a muster roll in Albany County, along with his son Peter Brewer, in 1782. They were at Duanesburgh. Peter's baptism has not been found but he was age 26-44 in 1800 (U.S. census, Duanesburgh) so born 1755-1763. Generally speaking migration from the Albany County area was westward through New York State. This began when the "Military Tract" consisting of bounty land grants given to Revolutionary War veterans opened up in the 1790s (there was also migration to this area by families directly from the Somerset/Hunterdon Cos. region of New Jersey). The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, this accelerated migration to western New York, the Great Lakes region and on to Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, etc. We know that Elias (no.23) moved west and south to Otsego County. From there descendants moved to the Niagara frontier region and then on to Michigan and Wisconsin. Abraham (no.25) Brouwer's descendants initially moved just a bit westward, along the Mohawk River, to Schenectady and the Schoharie area, and to Madison County, New York.

So, now an more concise summary tracking the movement of Jan Brouwer's descendants:

• 1657-1690 Flatlands, Long Island
• 1690-1710 Flatlands, Gravesend (Kings Co.) and Jamaica (Queens Co.), Long Island
• 1710-1720 Kings and Queens Counties, now including Hempstead; first move to the Freehold-Middletown area of Monmouth County, New Jersey
• 1720-1730 Hempstead, Freehold-Middletown, first move to the Somerset/Hunterdon County area of New Jersey.
• 1740-1750 Hempstead, Freehold-Middletown, Somerset/Hunterdon Counties
• 1750-1770 Hempstead, Freehold-Middletown, Somerset/Hunterdon. A first movement into Pennsylvania and/or Frederick County, Virginia is possible.
• 1770-1780 Hempstead, Freehold-Middletown, Somerset/Hunterdon. First migration to Albany County, New York. Probable presence in Pennsylvania and/or Frederick County, Virginia
• 1790-1800 All of the above, while westward migration begins to western New York, southwestern Pennsylvania, and probably into Ohio.
  
• 1800-1850 Still found in large numbers at Hempstead and in Monmouth County. Lesser numbers in the Mohawk Valley counties in New York State, and in the Somerset/Hunterdon County area. Migration westward continues via the Great Lakes into Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, and via the Ohio River into Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.

Summary of the Direct Male Descendants of Jan Brouwer of Flatlands, L.I. Through the Colonial Period.

 *The Family History Library in Salt Lake City as filmed and now digitized all of the probate and land books of both New York and Kings Counties, and they can be accessed online at FamilySearch.org.

**Please not that we do not yet know if this John Brewer, his brother Samuel and their father Richard Brewer, are, or are not, descendants of Jan Brouwer. We would need a Y-DNA test from a confirmed direct male descendant of either John or Samuel to determine whether or not they are with certainty.

Next post in this series, March 28, 2022.

BGB 711