This is an abridged version of a published and copyrighted document. This Newsletter appears in abridged form for purposes of brevity and elimination of duplicative information appearing in conjunction with this Newsletter elsewhere on the Internet. James Raywalt
For many years descendants of the first Enyarts on American soil have been toiling with the task of organizing the history of the Enyart family for its posterity. Many at least have made progress in placing their own lines on the family tree; however, family historians have found it nearly impossible to sort out confusing generations, resulting in frustration, speculation, and even abandonment of their initial hope.
It becomes clear that perhaps the best method to assist in the process of documenting and organizing our Enyart ancestry would be to prepare a periodic newsletter. Such a publication could increase the number of family members interested in our common heritage, and over the course of time make available more and more family information. Perhaps other family researchers would be willing to contribute time and resources, thus enabling the project to be of benefit to all interested members of the family.
I hope the results of this first issue, as well as future issues, will encourage other members of the family to contribute their knowledge, and to perhaps help with necessary research, especially in the localities in which they live.
For the reader's edification, I am a skilled and published genealogist, with nearly 30 years' experience in genealogical research. I am in my second year as the Assistant Registrar of the DC Society Sons of the American Revolution, and I belong to numerous other lineage societies. I have volunteered at the DAR Library in Washington, DC, and am well acquainted with its collection of genealogical materials. Despite these credentials, I am not an infallible researcher, and like most other people, I have a limited amount of time to devote to genealogical research. I therefore welcome subscriber and reader comments, support, advice and contributions, and hope that once seen, this Newsletter will serve as a guide for all who are interested in our common Enyart heritage.
James RaywaltIf you answered "yes" to any of the questions above, join us in the interesting and challenging effort to compile a more complete and accurate Enyart family genealogy.
The management of the newsletter is presently planned as described in this section. These standards may change at various times as a result of what has been learned in publishing earlier issues and as a result of subscriber suggestions and contributions.
ContentsThe Enyart family genealogy, like that of many families, is complicated by the repeated usage of certain given names, the migration of many branches of the family to various locations in the United States, and by a lack of complete and readily available primary source records for the first several generations in America. For these reasons, the first several issues of the newsletter will concentrate on the early American generations.
Articles compiled with information from various sources and focusing on individuals and families also will be published. Enyart records abstracted from published and unpublished sources will appear. These records will include, but certainly are not limited to, tax, military service, pension, land, church, census, Bible, newspaper and estate records. Enyart information occurring in county histories and biographical annals will also be published.
After a significant amount of historical data is published in the early issues, later issues will include some information on living Enyarts and their accomplishments and experiences, when such information is provided for publication.
Photographs and LettersAlthough they may not be published in the first few issues, older photographs will be published, if the persons or places in them are identifiable and have an Enyart connection. Because of the possibility of loss or damage, it is suggested that originals not be mailed to the editor. Reprints or high-quality photocopies could be sent with significantly less risk. Also, old letters, sent by or to Enyart family members will be published if photocopies are supplied.
Subscriber ParticipationSubscribers and other readers can assist the Newsletter editor and others in ways in addition to those already mentioned. First, subscribers can inform relatives, local genealogical and historical societies, and Enyart correspondents of the existence of the Newsletter. It is difficult to reach large numbers of potential subscribers or Enyart descendants who do not have the surname. If you prefer and will provide the addresses, the editor will send subscription notices.
Second, subscribers are encouraged to submit material for publication. Material should be organized and documented. Of course, personal reminiscences need not be documented. Photocopies of original documents and other source material associated with the submitted items should also be provided, if possible. With such copies, verification of accuracy will be easier, if questions are raised later. It may be sometime after it is received by the editor before such material is printed, but be patient; it will appear.
The editor reserves the right to edit all material as received for publication and not to publish material that, in the editor's opinion, is not sufficiently documented or does not meet the goals of the Newsletter. The editor does not assume culpability for errors in contributed material placed in the Newsletter or for editorial deficiencies, both of which are regrettable. All submitted material will be retained and made part of the Enyart Family Records Center, with the exception of original documents and photographs, which will be returned to the submitter.
Correction of ErrorsAs with any historical work, errors are regrettably inevitable. Readers can help keep the Newsletter as accurate as possible by taking the opportunity to correct errors that may from time to time be printed in the Newsletter. Compared to a major book-style genealogy, one advantage of a family news-letter is that published errors can be corrected within a relatively short time. In addition, supplementary information for articles appearing in one issue can easily be placed in a future issue.
Eventually the Newsletter may become a significant and reliable source for a comprehensive Enyart genealogy. At present, there are far too many missing pieces in the family puzzle to publish an acceptably comprehensive and definitive Enyart genealogy, despite the fine efforts of those who have previously attempted to do so.
Research NeedsWith each issue of the Newsletter, it will be obvious that further research is needed to solve many Enyart genealogical problems. Readers can help by offering to do research through various types of records in various depositories. A list of Research Needs may appear in the Newsletter, many of them associated with material in that issue. Readers who live in one of the areas, who visit or travel through one of the areas, or who have access to relevant microfilm of records from one of the areas addressed in an issue of the Newsletter are encouraged to help. To prevent research duplication, helpers should contact the editor by mail, e-mail or telephone, prior to doing the research. Appropriate credit will be given to all researchers in the Newsletter for any such efforts.
Any reference, no matter how brief, involving the Enyart name in historical records of any type will be received by the editor with appreciation.
As with any family, there are traditions in the Enyart family. One tradition focuses on the origins of the family itself, and asserts that Carel Injard (the first of our line) was of noble birth, being a grandson or great-grandson of William (the Silent) of Orange, Staatholder (Governor) of Holland. The tradition holds that Carel was shunned by family members when he married a "commoner." If this story has any basis in fact, Carel's ancestor (grandfather or great-grandfather) must have been an illegitimate child of William of Orange, for all of his legitimate children seem to be known. In addition, the assertion that Carel was shunned for marrying a "commoner" is unsupported, inasmuch as Carel was not himself considered a member of the nobility or a royal house. He was himself, by all accounts, a commoner. If he were shunned by family members because of his choice of spouse, it seems more feasible that it happened because the family did not approve of her for other reasons.
It has also been asserted that the surname Injard and its many variations derive from an early surname, van den Ingaard, having the meaning "from the inner garden." While this certainly may be considered a plausible theory, there does not yet appear to be any evidence that it is based on anything other than speculation.
CAREL1 INJARD, probably Flemish by ethnicity, was born about the year 1625/6. [n 1] He was among the hundreds of southern agricultural Netherlanders -- refugees from Brabant, Antwerp and Flanders -- who found their way to the New Netherland Colony on the western side of the Atlantic Ocean. On April 17, 1664, he, his wife and three children set sail with 33 other individuals aboard the ship De'Eendracht (the Concord) from Amsterdam under the command of Captain Jan Bergen. The ship arrived in the New Netherland Colony sometime before the end of August, and was the last ship to arrive with colonists from Holland prior to the conquest of the New Netherland Colony by the English in September 1664. The ship's passenger list provides only limited information:
It is possible that Carel had made the long Atlantic crossing once prior to 1664, for on March 15, 1655, one Charles Ensardt made an affidavit in connection with a trial pending before the New Amsterdam court. If these individuals are one and the same, then no doubt Carel came over ahead of his family to examine the prospects for survival and livelihood. Nevertheless, if he did in fact arrive in 1655, he shortly returned to his native land as evidenced by the age of his second child who, based on the De-Eendracht's passenger manifest, must have been born in 1656.
Carel settled at Staten Island, Richmond County, New York, where he made his living farming. He probably died there at an advanced age. Nothing is known of his wife, although it is believed she died in that place as well. The names of Carel's children (other than Jellis) are not definitely known, although some family researchers claim to have found evidence that the names of the three children who arrived in 1664 with Carel and his wife are:
Inasmuch as Staten Island's early civil and ecclesiastical records are no longer extant, it seems difficult to learn more of Carel and his wife on this side of the Atlantic Ocean; however, research continues.
1 Years so written are official dates, and usage of this method of date-writing begins with October 4, 1582, when Pope Gregory XIII adopted the Gregorian calendar, named for him. The British government did not impose the Gregorian calendar on all its possessions, including the American colonies, until 1752. Before that time, the Julian calendar had been in use, and the calendar year ran from March 25 to the following March 24. Under the new calendar, the British decreed that the day following September 2, 1752, should be called September 14, 1752, a loss of 11 days. All dates preceding were usually marked "O.S." for "Old Style." In addition, New Year's Day was moved to January 1 from March 25 (e.g., under the old style of dating, March 24, 1700 had been followed by March 25, 1701). This dating procedure becomes even more complex when it is related to the Dutch colonies in America, for the Dutch used the Gregorian calendar earlier than the British. In those times when the Dutch colonies fell under English rule (prior to 1752), dates were recorded according to English practices; however, during times of Dutch rule, dates were recorded using the Gregorian calendar. World Almanac and Book of Facts, 1989, p. 306.
JELLIS2 INYARD (Carel1) was born in Flanders on or about February 1, 1652. If we are to believe he is the son of Carel and that he arrived in 1664, he was then the twelve-year-old child who accompanied his parents and siblings on their journey to the New Amsterdam Colony. It was a journey that would change his life.
By way of background, the Dutch first became interested in the American continent in 1602 with the charter of the United East India Company. In 1609, that company employed Henry Hudson to search for the northwest passage. Hudson's exploration took him to Newfoundland, thence to the New England coast, around Cape Cod, south to Virginia, into Delaware Bay and finally along what is now the Hudson River. The first Dutch settlement in the colonies was established in 1613 in New Amsterdam (now New York), less than a year after Dutch merchants sent Frederick Christianson and Adrian Block to Manhattan Island to engage in fur trade. Many of the settlers were Huguenots who departed the French provinces of the Netherlands because of religious persecution by the Catholics. In the 1600s, the Netherlands was comprised of 17 provinces -- 11 northern, in which Dutch was the predominant language, and 6 southern, where the French dialect known as Walloon was spoken. The Netherlands included all of what we know today as Belgium and part of what is modern-day France. The northern provinces were Holland, Utrecht, Zeeland, Friesland, Groningen, Overijssel, Gelderland, Northern Flanders, Brabant, Mechlin and Limburg. The 6 southern provinces were Artois, Walloon Flanders, Cambrai, Tournai, Hainault and Namur.
Jellis occupied himself as a farmer and land-owner, having purchased land in Staten Island, New York as early as 1687. His first wife was Aetje (Alice), whose maiden name has not been learned. The couple was probably married in Richmond County, New York. We seem to first learn of Aetje's identity from a bill of sale in Staten Island dated July 18, 1692 (Book B, p. 174, Staten Island deeds), in which she is referred to as "Alice," the wife of "Jollis Inyard, Yeoman," but nothing additional is learned of her from that document. The deed conveys property to William George, yeoman, of Richmond County, New York. Jellis and Aetje had a family of at least two sons and three daughters, who survived to adulthood:
Aetje appears to have died in Richmond County sometime prior to 1703. After her death, Jellis married Triente (Catherine) VanWoggelum [Recently discovered to have been Trientie 'Catherine' Servaes VLIERBOOM,
According to the Planters Patents Book, [n2] on December 29, 1697 Jellis Inyard and Peter Pieterson received tracts of land "on the great plains on the north side of Staten Island in the rear of Cornelis Corsen's land." Jellis evidently remained in that place the remainder of his life. He died in Richmond County, New York in January 1706/7. His will, dated January 2, 1706/7, was probated in Richmond County on March 11, 1707/8. It is recorded in Liber 7 in the Surrogate's office in New York City. In this most important document, Jellis provided for his wife, three sons and three daughters, leaving the sum of �5 more to his eldest son, John, than to the rest.
In about 1710, Jellis' widow, Triente, married a man surnamed Baker -- possibly Nicholas Baker, who appears on the 1709 Staten Island, New York census as being aged 45 years. In August 1710, Triente
acknowledged the contents of Jellis' will and released any claim to his estate.
2 Planters Patents Book, No. 7, p. 179, S.I.H.S. Transcripts, Great Plains Fort, New York.
Where are the family bibles associated with the earliest generations of the Enyart family? The genealogical information they might contain could be of great importance in correctly compiling the family genealogy. Many early families had bibles in which they made family records of births, deaths and marriages. Certainly the Enyarts were inclined to exercise this practice as well. Some of those bibles may have been destroyed; hopefully at least a few still exist, but their present whereabouts seem unknown to Enyart family historians.
Subscribers are urged to be on the lookout for any pertinent bibles. They may be in the possession of Enyart descendants; they may be privately owned by people who are not Enyart descendants; they may be in the collections of historical societies or libraries; antique book dealers may have them for sale.
As the answers to certain family genealogical mysteries may lie solely in family bibles, hopefully some of those bibles will be located and the information contained within shared for posterity.
Following is a list of common Dutch and Frisian forenames with their English equivalents. Readers may find this guide useful not only for Enyarts who bear such names, but for other families of Dutch origin as well. This list is by no means all-inclusive and therefore may be enlarged from time to time, as additional names become known to the editor. This list was obtained from Ulster County, N.Y. Probate Records, Vol. I, by Gustave Anjou (NY, 1906).
This first issue of the Newsletter has been published in an attempt to unite the research efforts of many Enyart family researchers and to promote interest in the family as a whole. Your comments, suggestions and genealogical contributions for future issues of the newsletter will be gladly received.
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