RELEASE DATE: DECEMBER 6, 2020
KINSEARCHING
by
Marleta Childs
P. O. Box 6825
LUBBOCK, TX 79493-6825
[email protected]
As many genealogists know after utilizing his long list of publications over the years, David Dobson continually delves into primary and secondary sources regarding Scottish peoples on both sides of the Atlantic. The latest addition to his body of work is SCOTS-DUTCH LINKS IN EUROPE AND AMERICA, 1675-1825, VOLUME IV.
During the medieval era, Scotland developed strong social and economic ties to the Dutch. Scottish merchants and scholars gravitated as early as 1575 to the cities and universities of Holland, Zealand, and Flanders to partake of the commercial and educational opportunities they presented. Scottish Covenanters fled to the region to avoid religious persecution under the reigning Stuarts. Perhaps the largest number of Scots was soldiers fighting in the service of the United Provinces in the eighty-year struggle for independence against the Spanish Habsburgs and later France. In the seventeenth century, Scottish communities, which had their own churches, could be found throughout Holland and Zealand. By 1700, approximately one thousand Scots lived in Rotterdam alone.
The flow of human traffic also went the other way. A small number of Dutch merchants and craftsmen settled in Scotland. Some of them were attracted in 1672 by the Scottish government’s inviting inhabitants of the United Provinces to immigrate. Since the Scots were eager to gain the advanced mercantile, technological, and maritime skills employed by the Dutch, the government promised them full naturalization.
Name changes as individuals moved from one nation to another appear in Dobson’s records. For instance, John FLEMING (Jan DE VLAEMINCK) was a citizen of Antwerp around the year 1540. Scotsman Thomas JOHNSON (Thomas JANSSEN) gained his citizenship in Bergen-op-Zoom in 1501. Naturally, foreign settlers intermarried with local inhabitants. In 1616, William VAN ASSEN married Margaret DOWNIE in Edinburg in 1616. Gelestine VAN BEEST was the widow of James KIRKWOOD of Kelso in 1729.
This new volume gleans data primarily from primary sources, notably the records of the High Court of the Admiralty of Scotland. The book identifies some of the Scottish links, especially seafarers and merchants, to the Low Countries (Belgium and the Netherlands) as well as planters in the Dutch colonies in and around the Caribbean. For example, the entry for Alexander CRUIKSHANK states he died in Surinam in 1820. Captain John Gabriel STEDMAN was an officer in the Scots Brigade in the Netherlands before becoming a soldier in Dutch Guiana around 1800.
Following the format of the previous volumes, Dobson provides the individual’s name and the reference for the source material. Although details vary from person to person, details may include occupation (usually merchant, soldier, mariner, or student), a date, and place of residence. Marriage entries give the names of the couple, the date and place of the ceremony, and sometimes the name of a parent or previous spouse.
Through his constant diligent research, Dobson sheds more light on the early close connections between Scotland and the Low Countries (Belgium and the Netherlands). SCOTS-DUTCH LINKS IN EUROPE AND AMERICA, 1675-1825, VOLUME IV provides easy access to much useful material that family researchers have often overlooked.
The 132-page work has soft covers, an introduction, and illustrations. Names of the main individual of interest are arranged alphabetically. To the book’s price of $22.50, buyers should add the cost for postage and handling charges. For U. S. postal mail, the cost is $5.50 for one book and $2.50 for each additional copy; for UPS, the cost is $7.50 for one copy and $2.50 for each additional book. The volume (item order #8716) may be purchased by check, MasterCard, or Visa from Clearfield Company, 3600 Clipper Mill Rd., Suite 260, Baltimore, Maryland 21211 (for phone orders, call toll free 1-800-296-6687; fax 1-410-752-8492; website www.genealogical.com).