HvS | Links to Her and Sibs, Ancestors

I have been writing about Hilda van Stockum's relatives in different places. Here are links to these posts:

Herself: Her Art . Her Books, Publishers . Her Conversion 

Brother: Willem van Stockum – Book about him: Time Bomber

Father: Bram van Stockum – Expedition to Surinam . 
Life

Mother: Olga Boissevain van Stockum

Aunts: Tante Hessie (Hester Boissevain van Hall) . 
Tante Teau (Catharina Josephine Boissevain de Beaufort)

Uncles: Oom Eugen (Eugen Jan Boissevain)

Grandfather: Charles Boissevain

Grandmother: Emily Heloïse MacDonnell Boissevain

R.I.P. | Bram van Stockum (1864-1936)

Bram van Stockum in his first Dutch naval
officer's uniform. Photo from my collection.

Bram van Stockum was my mother's father. He died six years before I was born, so I never knew him. My most vivid memory of him is my mother's portrait of him late in life, with bushy white hair and a beard. Santa Claus.

The photo of Bram in his first naval officer's uniform suggests why my grandmother married him. An officer's uniform is hard to resist.

Hilda van Stockum on Her Father Bram 

My mother has described his uniform as it was later when his rank advanced. (I will try to find a photo of him at the higher rank somewhere–it must be in the Amsterdam Archief.)

Once my father served as a vice-admiral for a while and his beautiful uniform made a deep impression on me. He had a three-cornered hat with a plume. He had gold-braid epaulettes on his shoulders. The gold braid on his sleeves and trousers glittered and he wore a saber at his side and white gloves. He was covered with medals which he said he got for sailing and bowing at royalty.

The following is from my mother's lined copy book that I have marked Diary Book II. I have moved a few paragraphs around to improve the flow.

My father and mother were not the kind of people to discourage a child in his search for God. I made up my own mythology, patched up from various remarks made by grownups added to an inborn religious sense. I was really a Sun-worshipper. Early in life I associated the Sun with God. 

The first real grief I can remember is when my father went to the West Indies (Surinam) on an expedition and was away for many months. I was only three at the time [1911] but I missed him dreadfully. I'd go to the house of my aunt Mary [Mary Boissevain van Eeghan?] and she had made up a song for me about my dear father coming back, which she played on the piano. That comforted me.

My Father's Naval Career

My father's career in the navy was unusual. Several times he risked his reputation for an idea.

At the naval port of "Den Helder" there used to be exercises of the navy– one part of the fleet would be the "enemy" and the other "Dutch". The enemy would have to sneak into the harbor at night without having been spotted by a searchlight. In my father's early days he was appointed captain of such an "enemy" ship. And he didn't like the assignment. The "enemy" never won. It couldn't win. The searchlight covered all of the navigable space. 

Father felt it was unfair. He was always ambitious, and he wanted to win. He explored the approaches to the harbor and found a place not covered by the searchlights which was considered too shallow for the kind of ship my father commanded. My father always wanted to find things out for himself and he measured it. According to his calculations he could make it. And so, on the fateful night, he went over this dark stretch of water, his heart in his mouth. If he grounded that ship it would have been the end of his career in the navy. He often told us how he listened with beating heart to the ominously dwindling numbers of the depth meter–until at last... it remained steady... steady... steady and my father’s ship came through. 

It caused terrific excitement in Den Helder, as it was the first time the "enemy" had won for years. It was on that occasion that my mother first met my father and that he and she quarreled about the number of children they wanted to have. It was ten years later before they finally married. 

My father once won a sailing match through similar daring. He took his boat from Den Helder at the northern tip of Holland down to Rotterdam harbor in the south, whence he'd reach the lakes where the regatta was held. 

Unfortunately the wind rose while he was sailing over the North Sea and something went wrong with the rigging, so he couldn't take down the sails. They flew like a bird over the storm-tossed sea. "Can you swim?" asked my father anxiously of the sailor who was with him. “Like a brick," said the man, meaning it literally. But he had full confidence in my father. 

My father said they made Rotterdam harbor on account of the fact that all sails were up. He said if one of those enormous breakers had overtaken them they'd have been done for,  but they went faster. Nobody afterwards would believe that he'd gone into that harbor in that weather. 

The next day the wind had considerably abated but all the other sailboats had only half sails up. Of course my father saw no need in taking down his sails and so he won the match with ease. (We still have the little silver tea set he got on that occasion). 

My father always deplored the advent of steam. His first ship was a clipper and he could tell appetizingly of the activity and skill involved in handling sails and the way you were alive to the weather and became one with your ship.

World War I

Bram van Stockum had an important job in 1914, keeping open the port of Amsterdam, Ijmuiden. At that time his daughter Hilda was six and she had vivid memories of that period and of her father.

My father was very much against women and children being involved and he felt land-warfare was unchivalrous and messy. "At sea we do not fight against people." he said. "We save them when we can. We fight ships." 

It was the fact that the Germans broke this rule in their naval warfare and refused to save the crews of sinking ships or failed to give sufficient warning, that turned Father against then during the First World War.
They do not understand the laws of the sea," he said with disgust.

He was commander of the seaport to Amsterdam, Ijmuiden, in 1914. Once when a British warship was mined just outside the harbor he had the crew rescued, clothed, fed and dispatched to England before the night was gone.

Of course, my mother said, “Holland was neutral. But father was never neutral."He always maintained that we should have come to the aid of Belgium when it was brutally invaded by the Germans in 1914. "No matter when a brother is attacked, you don't stand by and do nothing–you help," said my father. "The same rule goes for nations as for individuals."

I often thought of those words when the 1939 war was upon us and he was so plainly proved right.

Once, during the First World War, my father invented a gadget that horrified my mother. It was a kind of automatic torpedo which could be directed infallibly towards an enemy harbor - where it would explode. My mother thought this diabolical and wept and argued until my father tore up this invention. Perhaps if there had been more wives and husbands like that we wouldn't have the atom bomb upon us now.

My father had tremendous physical strength and seemed to me most courageous. He smiled when I told him that. “Not at all–" he said. "I wasn't brave. I just couldn't imagine anything going wrong." He always said that he could stand any pain as long as he could clench his teeth–that's why he was a coward at the dentist's. He was so afraid of the dentist that he once pulled one of his own teeth. I can remember it clearly, my father standing in front of a mirror with a pair of plyers clenched around the offending tooth - tugging at it for all he was worth."Bram," my mother called from downstairs. "Dinner is ready!" "I'll be down in a minute." my father replied. "It's half out already!"

Bram's Expeditions for the Queen

Bram went on several expeditions for the Queen of Holland.

He used to have dinner with Queen Wilhelmina and he often told us children with relish how a minister had taken a spoonful of boiling hot soup and was growing purple in the face, unable to swallow it though not daring to return it to its original place. The Queen noticed it."Spit it out - your Excellency," she cried with maternal solicitude. "Spit it out!" 

He used to take me to see processions of the royal family - I'll never forget the lined streets - the waving flags - the handsome Cavalry men and the open carriage in which the Queen and prince consort bowed from left to right. When my father became a naval officer, the Queen of the Netherlands was very young. He saw her crowned as a girl of 18 and I think he fell in love with the slim, long-necked dignity of her. 

His feeling for her was always that of a champion and he often said he preferred to have a Queen to fight for than a King. Not that he did an awful amount of fighting. He participated in some minor skirmishes in the East Indies, that was all, until the first World War came. 

He was sent on several exploring expeditions in New Guyana (now Surinam), which he had described in a diary. He penetrated forests where no European had yet set foot and gave names to mountaintops, the Van Stockumberg being one of them.

Bram's Character

Bram was an unusual intellect and parent.

My father was a terrific arguer but a fair one. When you beat him in an argument he always acknowledged it and congratulated you with as much pleasure as if he'd thought of the idea himself. My mother says that her intellect went through a terrific course of training with him, as his ideas were so original and unconventional that he was hard to live with unless you could convince him that the generally accepted way was best. She managed to convince him several times, and on each occasion the matter was closed. My father gave in and the subject was never mentioned again. 

One such argument dealt with the training of us children. At heart my father was an anarchist with a flavor of Rousseau [who loved the state of nature]. He believed children to be naturally good and able to grow up perfect if not interfered with. All my mother’s efforts at discipline were considered interfering with nature. My mother said that nothing less than the welfare of her children would have embarked her on the argument that ensued. I believe they argued day and night for a week, but in the end mother won and we were brought up normal children instead of savages. 

The only remnant of his former attitude could be found in the fact that he didn't like our table manners to be corrected.
"The children will learn from looking at us." he maintained. "Meanwhile conversation at table should be pleasant." If mother sometimes forgot and burst out in irritation at our bad manners he'd leave the room. 

Another extraordinary trait of my father's was his opinion about time. One of the tragedies of my childhood invariably went like this: Father and Mother would take us out on a trip in the train. We were all dressed neatly and left much too early on account of Mother's nervousness. Father would laugh to see us go. "You'll have to wait for hours." he'd warn us. "I'll follow later." "I don't care." Mother would answer defiantly.

Of course we did have to wait for a long time on a cold and draughty platform. The train would eventually come, but not father. With tearful faces glued to the carriage windows we would see him arrive just as the train pulled out of the station. To go out together with him mother used to say, she'd have to aim for a later train and he for an earlier one.

Once we went on a trip in a donkey carriage with my father. We were not allowed to beat the donkey, even though it went at a snail’s pace. “It will run when it wants to," said my father treating us to many stories of gentleness and charity to animals. It was a very edifying journey but it took us all a day to get to the seaside place that we should have reached for brunch - and instead we all had to stay overnight at a hotel.;

The next day we went home by train and father's orderly made the return trip in the donkey carriage in two hours. You have no idea how slowly a donkey can go that knows it’s not going to be beaten! And how fast it can go if it does! I don't really know what that trip taught me. I think I dimly felt that some ideals cost more than they're worth. But I honored and loved my father for it all the same.

Both my father and my mother always followed their consciences. When they were atheists they were so from a mistaken idealism, because the God they were asked to believe in didn't measure up to their standards. Eventually they both became ardent believers. God could not have failed to love them even in the days when they denied Him.

My Father’s Teaching

Though my father was very busy at the time and was away sometimes for weeks on end, he wouldn't let me go to school but instructed me himself. He thought all schools were stupid, killed initiative, made knowledge unattractive and were physically unhygienic. He disliked us acquiring a vulgar way of speaking and feared the influence of other children.

My mother wasn't happy about it. She favored a more social attitude but she herself had suffered a lot from boredom at school and didn't care for the orthodox methods of education. She had just heard of Maria Montessori and was examining her methods. Meanwhile she taught me reading and writing by the Jan Lighthart method - a great improvement on the older ways.

My father understood arithmetic and geography. He was a very difficult taskmaster. He allowed no hesitation. If he told me to learn a table I had to know that table without pausing to clear my throat. I remember weeping hopelessly one afternoon because I couldn't "understand" the table of two.

My father didn't make allowances for a child's way of thinking. Instead of starting geography with a familiar thing like my own house, or our village, he began with the earth and the sun. There was a candle and an orange. I remember, and a lot of talk about stars and planets. The result of this was that I no longer pictured the night sky as a sheet with holes pricked in it to let through the glory of heaven.

My father's teaching was dramatic and descriptive and bolstered with logic. I pictured my life as an angel after death, flying between all these worlds in a space without an end - so it didn't matter if you fell for there was nowhere to fall to - and was it likely you'd ever meet another angel? Well, once in a while, perhaps - and then what would we do? Sit down in a world and chat for a while? What a dreary existence!

However it wasn't as dreadful as another nightmare I had, after my father had flatly told me that God was an invention of people who were too cowardly and lazy to stand on their own feet. I remember standing in front of him as he told me this, the lovely sunshine outside making an incongruous background. My father said it sadly, regretfully. There was no hatred, not even satisfaction in his voice. He was dreadfully sorry to disturb my illusion but honesty compelled him. No, there was no God - I might as well know now as later. I ran to my mother and asked her.

She was more concerned with my peace of mind and much less sure.
"I don't know," was all the comfort she could give me. I felt more deserted then I had done when they had left me because of illness and travel. I pictured what it would be like to die if there was no God. I could picture nothing - for ever. It was appalling. I had to stop myself from doing it because I knew it was bad for me. And secretly I didn't believe a word of it. I knew there was a God. But I remember freezing coldness. The freezing coldness of the thought.

It was at that time that we had a servant who was found to have stolen a lot of our things. They were found in her suitcase. There was a terrific scene. I still see the girl walk past me, weeping. I was horrified. Suddenly I knew very definitely that I must never lie or be dishonest in any way - neither with myself nor with others. "If you are truthful you will be saved," something told me deep inside myself. I promised this something that I would try - and any lapses against truth have always hurt my conscience more than any other sin.

Her Uncle Han de Booy's View

For an objective view of my mother's father, I turn to excerpts from the diary of his brother-in-law, Han de Booy, and his nephew Jim, that provide glimpses of Bram's life. Han was married to my grandmother's closest relative, Hilda Boissevain. My mother was named after her, and Hilda Boissevain's eldest daughter was named after my grandmother. The following excerpts from his diaries were translated and annotated by Han de Booy's daughter Engelien de Booy, who became a friend when she was retired and I visited her at her home in Bilthoven. I have made a few minor edits to her translations to bring the idiom in line with U.S. English conventions. For example, where a woman’s maiden name would follow her married name in Holland (and in Spanish-speaking countries), with a hyphen, as in “van Hall-Boissevain”, I have followed Anglo-Saxon practice of having the maiden name precede the married name, without a hyphen, as in “Boissevain van Hall”. I have also changed dates for simplicity to the uniform genealogical format of day, three-character month, and year.

World War I, 1912-1916

Han de Booy is crazy about his sister-in-law but not so much Bram.

6 Apr 1912. Dinner at Drafna with Olga and Bram [van Stockum], who had come back. Bram and I got along well. I talked with him about the naval defense of Holland against the Germans. He wants torpedo ships, land-based batteries of anti-submarine guns, and Holland’s own submarines. He is convinced that Holland would win.
7 Oct 1912. On Saturday and Sunday I went to the Hague with dear Olga, Bram’s wife. In the evening we went to Rijswijk, where Bram and Olga live in a cramped and rather disorderly house. We had bread and shrimps for supper. On Sunday morning we took a walk along the beach at Scheveningen. We went back to Rijswijk where Bram cooked rice in a rice-cooker he invented. He hopes to make money from his invention. This time he didn’t talk any more about torpedoes. On this visit I’m afraid I began to pity him. The poor wretch is so wrapped up in all his inventions he has an unruly home and badly trained servants. I had a poor impression of their lives and I pitied Olga as well.

To balance this dismal picture, here is a fragment of the diary of Jim de Booy, Han's nephew, who met Bram two years later:

I met Captain van Stockum in the street. He had just arrived to take command of the port [Ijmuiden] and asked me to join his staff, which I was delighted to do. The command included all the coastal defenses as well as the running of the port. Capt. van Stockum was a great inventor. He invented a mine that would float under water, and a mirror for investigating the stomach, and a rice boiler. He put this ingenuity to work improving the defenses of the port. The principal port of Ijmuiden had two gun-turrets lit by kerosene lamps...

The same year, however, Bram seems to have left the Navy in a pique, not the best way to leave. Han is legitimately concerned about his sister's future.

9 May 1914. Took a walk on the heath with Jan van Hall, Hessie [Hester Boissevain van Hall], Teau [Catherina Boissevain de Beaufort, the youngest and widely viewed as the most beautiful of Charles and Emily Boissevain’s daughters, although Mary was also considered very beautiful], and Fik [Ferdinand de Beaufort]. We talk about Bram’s plan to leave the Navy, just when Olga was starting to revive in her beautiful Navy-dockyard house, and was just getting to know the Navy people at the port. Bram says he is going to leave because he can’t stand all the paperwork (the “bumf”). He won’t even delay his departure from the Navy by a few months to collect an extra 200 guilders a month pension. He is planning on going to work at a Dutch factory but he doesn’t know for sure if he can get a job there. They are going to have to move to a small house.

Bram leaves the Navy. Han is admiring of his brother-in-law's ability to come up with new ideas, but skeptical of Bram's ability to earn money from it. As an economist who has read a few things about the beneficiaries of innovation, I can say that Han was right to be skeptical. Bram was not alone in creating credible inventions that he did not cash in on. (In the case of his depth-regulation device for mines, it was used by the Norwegian Navy, but Bram never seems to have earned anything from it.)

15 Jan 1915. Bram [van Stockum] believes strongly the Allies are going to win. The war is just beginning. He is going to build a wind-powered generator on his house. [Ahead of his time! Although Han seems skeptical.]
31 Jun 1916. Walked to Bram and Olga in Boschlust. The house is old and dilapidated. The guest room is shabby and has a short bed. Talked with Bram who is busy with all his inventions: a mine with depth-regulation device, a flame-extinguisher on torpedo-ships, a steering device for an air-ship and an anti-aircraft gun. At 11 p.m. to bed, and Bram starts working. He goes to bed at 3 a.m. as a rule.
17 Oct 1916. Bram tells at dinner about his inventions for making observations in Surinam. For example, he did his work at night to avoid faults of the instrument caused by the sun’s heat. He constructed a well-working artificial horizon. And so forth. The boys [Tom and Alfred de Booy] listen with great interest.

Sickness and Apparent Recovery, 1917-1919

Bram seems to have picked up a long-term illness in his expeditions to the Dutch colonies (most likely Surinam).

5 Jul 1917. Today Bram van Stockum was brought to the Institution of Prof. Bouman from Boschlust by three male nurses. He went willingly, saying he “would not resist force majeure.” He is very content at the moment. The doctor thinks the situation is very serious.
25 Apr 1918. Today Bram van Stockum lunched with us and he talked with Hilda [de Booy] about his revelation, his rejuvenation etc., and Hilda listened very calmly – she looks at these kind of beliefs with less prejudice, because of her theosophy.
6 Feb 1919. Went in the evening with Bram van Stockum to the Concertgebouw. We listened to a new composition of Zagwijn with weird but beautiful sounds, and a wonderful “Don Juan.” [Han de Booy was on the Board of the Concertgebouw, as was his brother-in-law Charles E. H. Boissevain.]

Funeral, 1936

Han attended Bram's funeral and gives him a sympathetic and appreciative eulogy.

2 Jan 1936. Funeral of Bram van Stockum. Olga had not seen him since he had been taken ill [in 1933?]. [Olga lived in Washington, D.C. with her daughter Hilda since 1933. She came with the family to Montreal in 1947 and died there in 1949.] The funeral was at 3:30 p.m., a third-class function but a very sympathetic group of mourners. Col. de Viner and I spoke. Bram was a very special person, very brave, independent. A very keen brain, but at the same time childish, naïf, and steadfastly believing in his own earthly immortality.

Bram van Stockum's youngest  brother Johannes (Jo) also died, five years earlier, of an exotic disease, picked up in Africa.

BRAM VAN STOCKUM | Expedition 1902-03

Boatload of warriors serving under my grandfather
and the Dutch tricolor, in what is now Surinam.
My mother, Hilda van Stockum, added the ID at top.

May 8, 2006 – Bram van Stockum, my maternal grandfather, was a naval captain and was commander of the port of Amsterdam at IJmuijden during World War I, when Holland was neutral.

I visited IJmuiden last month and it is still a busy port for commercial shipping traffic. It is also now a place where you can find excellent seafood restaurants.

Expedition to Surinam

In 1902-03, the Queen of the Netherlands dispatched an expedition to Surinam (what was then called Dutch Guyana) in the former Dutch West Indies. Then-Lt. Bram van Stockum was put in charge of it.

Bram van Stockum on expedition in
what is today Surinam. He found the
source of its Saramacca River in 1903.

The Queen's expedition to Surinam was to find the source of the Saramacca River and my grandfather was successful.

He wrote a book about the expedition that is based on his journal (Dagboek), and is available to read in Dutch online.

I was just given an album of photos by my sister Brigid and a photo of one of the boats that served under my grandfather is in it.

There are also several photos of my grandfather that I have never seen before. One is of him deep in the jungle on his expedition.

Bram van Stockum seems to have died of a disease that he acquired on an expedition to this Dutch colony. His youngest  brother Johannes (Jo) also died of an exotic disease, picked up in Africa.

PATSY AND THE PUP | "My Favorite Book," says Hachikō

Hachikō says: "Patsy and the Pup is my favorite
 book." A nice book and you can get it. Photo by
JT Marlin.

My name is John and I am the younger son of Hilda van Stockum, who wrote Patsy and 
the Pup.

This post is about Patsy, her pup, and Hachikō.

About Hachikō

My wife Alice and I adopted a puppy that we named chūken Hachikō after a loyal dog that is a legend in Japan.

The adoption took place a few days ago, on March 23, which I discovered is National Puppy Day. So that put me in mind of Patsy and the Pup.

Wookiee Warriors–from Wookieepedia.

Hachikō is from a farm in upstate New York. The mother was a  Schnauzer.  The father is reportedly a Pomeranian, but on that farm they didn't keep a lot of records, so there is room for other theories.

Our daughter Caroline's theory is that Hachikō is at least half-wookiee. Someone else tells me that Hachikō is more of the size of an ewok, i.e., a smaller bear-like version of the wookiee. But Hachikō looks more like a wookiee than an ewok.

What do you think? Hachikō can be seen in the first photo at top reading my mother's book Patsy and the Pup. He is sitting in Alice's lap.

Oh, and Hachikō loves the book.

Patsy and the Pup

The book is about a dog that follows home a girl named is Patsy, for whom the model is clearly Elisabeth (whom we call Lis), except that Patsy lives in Ireland. She must bring the dog back to its owner. She loves the dog and wants to keep it, but she is told she is too young.

She has many adventures, but in the end Patsy successfully brings the dog back to its owner. Ten there is a surprise ending that should make any child happy.

The real-life models for Patsy and the pup were my younger sister Lis and her dog Trusty, a female pup. We had to leave Trusty behind with a friend when she was about four calendar years old, because of the six-month-quarantine laws for importation of dogs in Ireland in 1951.

Dogs in HvS Books and Art

Dogs are featured in many of Hilda van Stockum's books and artwork. They play an important role in The Winged Watchman, for example, when the Nazi Wehrmacht decides to require every Dutch dog to be evaluated for Army service. The original and latest cover of The Borrowed House has a dog standing behind Janna. On the cover of HvS's very first book, A Day on Skates, there is a little dog looking at the skaters...

Patsy and the Pup is, of course, all about a dog. So, I guess, is Pamela Walks the Dog, which is about a virtual dog; it was illustrated by HvS but the story was written by Christine Marlin.  In The Mitchells, a dog is a key part of the end of the story as Mr. Mitchell is worn down and endorses the idea that the family should have a dog. (That actually happened when the family moved from Lachine, then outside of Montreal, to Argyle Avenue in Westmount.)

Many of HvS's illustrations or landscape paintings show a dog somewhere in the foreground. Mostly they seem to be middle-sized, like terriers, but Andries features a big dog, looks like a Labrador. HvS wrote Rufus Round and Round originally about a Yorkie that she acquired from me.

A lot of her paintings and illustrations have little dogs in them. Can you think of some more?

BOISSEVAIN | Gens 0-6 (Updated July 1, 2016)

Gideon Jérémie Boissevain
Jr. (II), 1796-1875.

The following is structured as a genealogical Family Group starting with two men named Lucas who headed the Boissevain family in Holland. One stayed in France and the son left for Holland. 

The six generations of Boissevain descendants who lived in Holland are shown here (i.e., starting with Lucas Jr. as Gen1). The numbering system is the Henry Method employed by the late Matthijs Boissevain, showing both male and female descendants. The numbers were featured on the identification badges of the participants in the 1992 Boissevain Reunion in Boissevain, Manitoba, Canada.

The Henry Method has been modified in several ways, some of which are described here, to simplify the format.

References marked NP are to the page of the Nederland's Patriciaat, 1988; the Boissevain family starts on p. 40. In the NP, only male descendants are followed and the language is in Dutch. Both aspects pose barriers for many users, in addition to the scarcity of copies of the 1988 NP. Roman numerals are also used frequently in the NP and are in disfavor among Anglo-Saxon genealogists because they are not computer-sortable.

A genealogy through Gen8 and possibly Gen9 will be posted shortly and will then be published in some form.

Authorship of this genealogical table and related short bios–a work in progress during the summer of 2016–could be ascribed as follows: "Matthijs Boissevain, John Tepper Marlin and Noah Sisk, Boissevain Generations 1-6". Matthijs was the originator, Gen8. Marlin is Thijs's cousin once removed, Gen9. Sisk is Thijs's great-grandson, Gen11. Marlin and Sisk worked on the genealogy together in April-June 2016 and continue to do so.

Acknowledgments: Besides Tice Boissevain, on whose work the genealogical tables are based, I would like to express my appreciation for the continuing assistance of relatives dead and alive. For example, the Boissevain house tours in Amsterdam was made possible in large part by an article in Dutch by Ernst G. Boissevain for the 1993 Boissevain Bulletin that I machine-translated by Google Translate and then edited. Thanks to my late mother, Hilda van Stockum, for translating so much from Dutch and spending many hours trying to explain to me the intricacies of her Dutch relatives and their relationships. Thanks to Charles Leidschendam Boissevain and his daughter Aviva Boissevain for being so active in bringing the Boissevain relatives together, continuing Tice's making family members more aware of one another. Thanks to Noah Sisk's grandmother Pam Boissevain Wilkinson and her sisters Romelia (Rommy). Let me add before I forget the translation help of Francesca van Hamel, the invaluable translation and archival assistance of Engelien de Booy and the help of institutions in Amsterdam–the Archief, NIOD, the Versetzmuseum. Also Ben Boissevain's encouragement that I spend more time on this, although I never followed up on his suggestion that I have the work funded through a Crowdfunding exercise (this turns out to be a time-consuming project of its own). I will be adding to this list as I remember or am reminded!! Comments appreciated by email or as a posted comment below. –JTM

BOISSEVAINS – GEN0-GEN6

The following illustrates the generations through to Charles Handelsblad Boissevain. (This is being worked on.)

Gen0. The Ur-Boissevain, Lucas Bouyssavy Sr. (1640?-1685?) of Bergerac, Dordogne, France. He is said to have died in France soon after Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes.

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Gen1. Lucas Boissavin Jr. 1660-1705, X 1700 Marthe Roux. In about 1895 he fled to Belgium and then Holland. Marthe also fled Bergerac. They were married in Rotterdam September 1, 1700. The marriage date seems to conflict with the story told in several places that Marthe Roux had two infants with her when she left France.

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Gen2. Jérémie Boissevain 1702-1779.

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Gen3. Gédéon Jérémie Boissevain 1741-1808.

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Gen4. Daniel Boissevain 1772-1834.

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Gen5. Gédéon Jérémie Boissevain 1796-1875. There were other children of Daniel.
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Gen6. Charles "Karel" Handelsblad Boissevain X Emily Héloise MacDonnell. There
other children of Gédéon Jérémie.

Source: Barthold Hubert Boissevain, Stamboek der Boissevains [Genealogy of the Boissevain Family], Amsterdam: Jacob van Campen, 1937.  Numbers in parentheses after the dates of birth and death are from the Stamboek. Generation numbering follows that of Matthijs (Tice) Boissevain.

GEN 0-1 | Lucas Sr. and Jr.

0. Lucas Bouissavy, Sr. 1620?-1685

      1. Lucas Bouissavy/Boissavin, Jr., 1660-1705 X (1700) Marthe Roux, 1664-1727

             11.  Isaac Bouissavy, 1701-? (may have died in infancy)

             12. Jeremie Bouissavy (Boissevain), 1702-1762

             13. Marthe Anne Boissevain, 1705-1767

0   Lucas Bouissavy (1631?-1685?) is the Ur-Boissevain, who starts the Boissevain Family Group. By most accounts he lived in the Dordogne, in Couze St. Capraise in Bergerac–the same Bergerac that long-nosed Cyrano made famous, suggesting that the prominent Boissevain nose has a regional origin. It's a lovely place. Sacha Boissevain once said to me: "We should never have left." They didn't have much choice after Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes. Apparently the property was left to a younger son who stayed behind. An Irish source says the name Boiscevain was used and the family originally came from what was then called the Cévennes, a name given by the Romans to an area that would now mostly be in today's Ardèche. This information (?) I find nowhere else but in this Irish source, but much of it seems possible, some of it even likely:

The Boissevain family of Amsterdam is derived from that of "Boiscevin," originally settled in the region of the Cévennes. Having early embraced the Reformation, they must have shared and suffered in the religious wars in that district, throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; even after the Edict of Toleration was signed at Nantes by Henry of Navarre, in 1598, the persecutions were frequently renewed, and many of the Huguenots fled to seek safety elsewhere. This was especially the case about 1629, when Louis XIII (surnamed the "Just") destroyed the town of Privas and other places, and laid waste much of the Cévennes. At all events the Boiscevins appear to have been transplanted to Bergerac (on the Dordogne, about 40 miles east of Bordeaux) a town which had been dismantled by Louis XIII in 1621, for its Calvinistic tendencies. There they appear to have occupied a good position until the momentous revocation of the Edict of Nantes, October 24th, 1685. This at once forced half a million of the most useful citizens of France to abandon their country, and seek a refuge elsewhere. Some of the Boiscevins also fled, endeavouring to escape to Holland. The father, with his wife and two little daughters, attempted to pass the frontier. He himself was captured and shot. His wife and the two girls were concealed in a wagon of hay. The soldiers of the guard thrust their lances through the hay; they pierced both children (who never recovered), and they wounded the mother in the thigh. The brave woman, who at the time was enceinte, allowed no sound to be wrung from her either by pain or terror. The wagon passed on with its wounded and dead. She arrived at the Hague, where she bore a son, who received the name of “Lucas.” 

This story makes sense only if we assume that Marthe Roux was married to someone else in France and they both tried to escape with their two children. This actually seems more probable than that a married couple would try to escape separately. But then Marthe Roux would have remarried in the Netherlands. Lucas was her husband.

Gidéon Louis Boissevain in
front of the Biltmore Hotel,
NYC, about 1922.

1   Lucas Bouyssavy/Boissavin, Jr. (1660-1705) is the original emigrant from France, the common ancestor of all the Boissevains in the world. Lucas was a Huguenot who lived happily in the Dordogne, France but had to leave behind his father Lucas Bouissavy Sr. (1671-1687) and brother because, as my mother told me often, the Huguenots were made unwelcome by the Sun King, Louis XIV. By revoking the religious-freedom principles of the Edict of Nantes, sunny Louis made being a Huguenot a treasonous act punishable by death. Lucas sold his property upon deciding to emigrate to Holland soon after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. He escaped among the wine barrels on a boat from Bordeaux to Rotterdam. In one version of the story, this Lucas married Marthe Roux in Rotterdam. She had escaped separately, hiding in a hay wagon. When the wagon reached the border, a soldier checked the hay by plunging his bayonet into it. Despite the bayonet cutting into her thigh, Marthe Roux had the presence of mind to wipe the blood off the bayonet when it was removed; of such stuff were the Boissevain women made. Lucas and Marthe were the first generation to settle in Holland. The legends of Marthe Roux vary in detail. One source says two infants with her in the hay wagon were killed by the bayonet. Another says that one of the two infants died in Antwerp because of the onerous travel conditions. Some accounts of the family start with this Lucas rather than his father, perhaps because of the confusion about who the father of this Lucas was.

GENS 2-3 |  Jérémie and Gédéon (Gideon) Jérémie Sr.

12      Jérémie Boissevain (1702-1762, NP III), accountant X Marie Charlotte du Chesne, 1733 (article).
          122  Gédéon Jérémie Boissevain Sr. (1741-1802) X Margaretha Quien, 1767. NP IV.

Children of Gédéon Jérémie Sr. and Margaretha
1221    Marie Charlotte Boissevain (1768-1808).
1222    François Jeremie Boissevain
1223    Daniël Boissevain, Sr. (1772-1834, NP Va 45) X Johanna Maria Retemeyer (1796).
1224    Jean Boissevain.
1225    Henri Jean (1777-1823 NP Vb 133).  Six more children.

GENS 4-5 | Daniël and Gideon Jérémie Boissevain Jr.

1223    Daniël Boissevain, Sr. (1772-1834, NP Va 45). Married Johanna Maria Retemeyer, 1796. He started the newspaper (Algemeen Handelsblad) that his son Gideon inherited and his grandson Charles Handelsblad made famous.  He had 11 children.

12231  Gideon Jérémie Boissevain Jr.  (1796-1875, NP VI 48), also Handelsblad publisher. By his first wife Antoinetta Elizabeth Klijn he had a son who died neonatally and she appears to have died during childbirth. By his third wife Maria van Heukelom (1801-1866) he had seven more children, who would be most of the sixth generation of Boissevains in Holland.

12232  Daniël Boissevain Jr. (1804-1878, NP VIb 83).

12233  Edouard Constantin 1810-1885 NP Vic 102.

GEN 6 | Children of Gideon Jérémie.

122311 Son, died neonatally.
122312 Daniël Boissevain, Jr. (1831-1849).
122313 Walrave Boissevain (1833-1854).
122314 Annette Boissevain (1835-1894).
122315 Jan Boissevain (1836-1904, NP VIIa 52). Shipowner. His descendants are the Jantjes.
122316 Charles Handelsblad Boissevain (1832-1927, NP VIIb 67).  Twin of Hester. He had 11 children by his Irish wife, Emily Heloïse MacDonnell. Charles becomes 0 in another Family Group, and his descendants are shown there. They are called the Kareltjes or Charletjes (article).
122317 Hester Boissevain (1842-1914). Twin of Charles. Married Nicolaas Jacob den Tex.
122318 Jacob Pieter Boissevain (1844-1927). Worked for Boissevain & Co. in Batavia.

GEN 6 | Children of Daniel

122321  Gideon Maria (1837-1925, NP VIIc 88).
122322  Jacques Elie (1839-1918, NP VIId 90).
122323  Athanase Adolphe Henri (1843-1921, NP VIIf  93).
122324  Mijnhard Johannes (1845-1917, NP VIIg 97).
122325  Louis Daniël (1848-1916, NP VIIh 100).

GEN 6 | Children of Edouard Constantin 

122331 Willem (1849-1925 NP VIIi 107) 
                   Daniel François (1856-1929 NP VIIj 118)
      Henri Jean Arnaud (1813-1891 NP Vie 122)
                        Hieronimus (1849-1918 NP VIIl 123). 
                Louis Daniël (1852-1921 NP VIIm 127)
                Ursul Philip (1855-1930 NP VIIn 130).
       Jean Henri Guillaume (1817-1870 NP Vif) 136 (photo)
                Willem Frederik Lamoraal (1852-1919 NP VII p 138) (article)
                Auguste Charles Hugo 1864-1929 NP VIIq 144

This blog is sponsored by Boissevain Books, which publishes books by Hilda van Stockum and others. To help sustain this work, buy a book at www.boissevainbooks.com.

HvS ART | Madonna and Child

HvS, "Madonna and Child", image
posted by permission of the artist's
estate (c/o Boissevain Books LLC).

I remember both the painting and the sculpture that it features, and the two candlesticks as well.

The wooden sculpture was a gift of John Dowling, who was a dentist in Dublin with a large family. Mom was close to both John and his wife Joan. She went with Joan to Lourdes because Joan was seriously ill.

We used to go to John Dowling for dental work when we were in Dublin during the years 1951 to 1954 (in 1954-55 we were in Sceaux, outside of Paris on the Ligne de Sceaux).

As a father himself, Dr. Dowling had a way of making sure that children paid attention to his instructions on keeping your head steady and so forth. In my case he painted a scary picture of what might happen if I failed to follow his instructions. I hasten to say that Dr. Dowling might well have been justified in taking this approach with me.

John Dowling was one of the people that Mom knew from her days as an art student in Dublin and she still had a soft spot for him and he knew it.

She was bowled over by the statue. Being eight or nine years old, and remembering Dr. Dowling as a terrorizing dentist, I recollect saying something critical about the sculpture that made Mom furious (see previous paragraph for background). I have a sense that my criticism of the statue may have prompted the painting. What better way for her to telegraph her appreciation for the statue than to do a painting of it?

Anyway, stories about paintings raise their value, so this long epic about it might help the gallery sell the painting for a decent price. It is up for auction in Dublin at Adam's and is posted on Invaluable Auctions as well as AskArt.

My sister Brigid confirms that Mom was emotionally vested in the statue. She writes:

That statue is memorable to me because the day before my wedding [in Montreal, June 27, 1957] Daddy had cleared the house [419 Lansdowne Avenue, just above Sherbrooke St.] ready for the wedding party, and Mother couldn't find her statue and went shouting around the house in a fury, thinking Dad had destroyed it. I finally found it in the big Dutch press, but Mother took a long time to simmer down.

(I have that big Dutch press. The Dutch designed it so it could be brought upstairs in the narrow Amsterdam houses piece by piece, and assembled in the room.)

Lot 30: Hilda van Stockum HRHA (1908 - 2006) Madonna Oil on board, 43 x 28.5 cm. (17" x 11.25")

by Adam's

March 23, 2016, 6:00 PM BST

Dublin 2, Ireland 

Estimated Price: €500 - €700 

Description: Hilda van Stockum HRHA (1908 - 2006) Madonna Oil on board, 43 x 28.5cm (17" x 11¼")

Signed lower left corner with initials. Image © Estate of Hilda van Stockum.

This blog is sponsored by Boissevain Books, which publishes books by Hilda van Stockum. To buy a book and support keeping her work alive, go to www.boissevainbooks.com.

HvS | The Allure of the Oxford Group (Post #100, Updated Sep 27, 2016)

The Oxford Group – an "emergency camp".

The following was generously transcribed by Michael Fitzgerald in response to my appeal for help. It is the article by Hilda van Stockum in the May 1935 St. John's Church (Church of Ireland) bulletin, reprinted from the Episcopalian journal The American Church Monthly, which was published in New York City in 1857-58 and was continued in 1917-1937. 

HvS lived in New York in 1932 and then moved to Washington, D.C. when her husband started working for FDR.

HvS likens the Oxford Group to an "emergency camp" and makes it sound a lot more like its illustrious precursor, the Oxford Movement, than I was ever led to believe. One difference is that the Oxford Movement brought evangelical thinking mainly within the Anglican Church, and had a stronger Oxford connection. 

The essay below is a strong and clear-eyed statement of the appeal of evangelical movements and their helpfulness for people seeking religious identity or inspiration. In HvS's case, it led to her conversion to Anglo-Catholicism–which she compares with a "Gothic Cathedral"–and eventually in 1938 to her following Evie Hone into the Roman Catholic Church.

A gothic cathedral, which HvS likens to the Catholic Church. (Cologne.)

I am no scholar and no theologian. Much of what I am going to say will seem crude to more experienced people, yet I feel there may be some to whom the faithful account of a personal growth is acceptable and helpful.

In the first place, I would like to clear the “Oxford Group” from certain unjust aspersions which from time to time have been cast upon it; and state definitely where I have found it rich and nourishing, and where I felt I had to wean myself from it.

To me the Group has been like mother’s milk, sustaining my first efforts towards spiritual life, yet unable to meet the later demands of my hungry soul once it began to grow.

I am going to deal principally with the Ideal Group, or the Group as it means to be. I want to speak about essentials and not the accidental imperfections which always will creep into any man-made movement. Now I don’t think the Ideal Group could offend any Christian–its purpose is so simple, its message so clear, and it throws such a beautiful ringing challenge into a confused haphazard world.

It wishes to put aside all theological disputes, intellectual worries, or scientific scruples, and go straight towards the “experience of Christ.” For experience is not the same as knowledge. We may be expert gynecologists and yet never bear babies; whilst a simple savage accomplishes the miracle by following blind instinct. In the same way we may be perfect theologians and yet never really experience the Peace of God which passeth understanding; while the grocer at the corner store may be full of it without knowing what it is called.

On the other hand there is no reason why experience and knowledge should not go together, and no one will deny that that is a more perfect condition. All the Group asks is that we shall not confuse the two, that we shall be able to put aside the intricate concoctions of our intellect and find the hidden flaw which is preventing us from following those instincts which through the ages have led man to God. And this is not begged of us as a favour, nor impressed upon us as a duty; but it is flung at us as a challenge, with a blast of trumpets, waving of flags, and beating of drums.

The Group does not ask us for a specific act or belief; it does not want us to fit into a special code; it takes us where we are and as we are and treats us in that irresistibly impudent fashion which is common amongst small schoolboys; it dares us to do something specially difficult, something almost impossible, by telling us that So and So, two houses farther down, performed the same feat successfully.

It asks us to “surrender” our wishes, our personality, our dreams, even our pet prejudices; to give our whole heart as a gift to God, and walk as did one of the first disciples of our Lord, doing His will.

There is something very fine about such a stupendous request. It is actually easier to comply with than a less exacting demand would be, because it fires the imagination, which is after all one of the chief moving forces of our human nature. Such a challenge takes one’s breath away. Daily trifles sink into nothingness and life seems astonishingly simple.

For a moment a cold fear grips our heart; the idea of giving oneself to the Great Unknown creates a panic–yet the appeal is irresistible, and we let go. The barrier which divides us from God is washed away by a flood of penitent and grateful tears, and He comes pouring in on us with a sweetness and light that momentarily transform the world. We get up from our knees and we feel that we are different and will never be quite the same again. However far we may stray, we never can forget this moment.

Perhaps only a little of all this is noticed by outsiders, yet our intimates may suddenly find us easier to deal with, less rebellious or self-assertive and with an obvious newborn happiness. That, at any rate, is what the Group did for me. After years of puttering about and searching in books and churches for “religion,” it came to me as simply as that–through a few sentences in a book written by a “Grouper.”

It was the challenge that pierced me and roused me to action; making me realize how I was drifting and indulging in self-pity and “sulking” against a God whom in my heart I worshipped. I was so utterly unaware that such experience of God is as general as it is beautiful, that Christian churches are full of men and women who have had it one time or another in their lives, that I made rather a fool of myself trying to convert perfectly genuine Christians to the Oxford Group, believing it was the only surviving branch of the old Apostolic tree. It was only later that I began to realize that the “tremendous revelation” was only the first initiation into real Christianity.

There is another dictum of the Group which seems to me very helpful and healthy, in a world that  undoubtedly has suffered through certain “Protestant Virtues,” especially the virtue of “reticence” or “reserve.” It is true that some natures find it difficult to communicate with others. There is the feeling of having a “Holiest of Holies” which must not be desecrated by profane eyes (“profane” meaning in this case anybody’s eyes but one’s own). This sentiment one finds often expressed in “novels written for young ladies,” where the heroine would rather be torn to pieces than to confess a perfectly harmless little belief or emotion.

I used to be jealous of such fortitude, for I myself could never hold my tongue nor seem ever to have anything worth concealing. This strong, silent businessman’s ideal, which is individualistic and easily leads to spiritual pride, besides being utterly unlike the New Testament Spirit, has been duly punctured by the Group, and pronounced by it to be purely selfish. We are to share our joys and sorrows and sins with our fellow creatures, and no man is too mean to be taken into our confidence (within the limits of good taste, of course).

To my mind such a conception is wholly in keeping with the Spirit which made Saint Francis embrace the leper, and it is a very healthy reaction against the sort of attitude which made my granny [Emily Hélöise MacDonnell] think it bad form to mention God, as though he were a poor relation. 

The Ideal Group, then, is not a sect and can never grow into one if it remains true to its ideals. It wishes to unite instead of separate. It stresses those points which different denominations have in common and encourages experience of God as the important thing which comes before mental affirmation. Thus Baptist, Quaker, or Roman Catholic are all alike to the Group as long as they are living a “surrendered” life. The Group wishes to serve the Holy Spirit which “bloweth where it listeth” and cannot therefore be judged according to the standards applied to a special sect. For it does not know whither it will be blown and is prepared to move wherever it pleases the Spirit.

Its object is not to replace the Church, but to fill it with spiritual power. Thus the Group is able to reach people who otherwise would have continued their existence thinking of Church and Christianity as extinct volcanoes; it challenges those who did not know there was any challenge in the message of Jesus; it awakens sleepers who had been passed by in the daily routine of professional Church-workers.

Perhaps one reason why the Group strikes such a refreshing note in a rather compromising and weary world is that it has a strong and startling definition of sin: “anything which comes between you and God, or between you and your fellow-creatures.” What a light such a definition throws on many petty “virtues” which we indulged in for our own self-gratification even when they but irritated the members of our household through the smug righteousness of our manner. How many “weaknesses” are thus exposed as ugly growths?

To me, at any rate, there was a lot of revelation in the way the Group saw the world and its temptations. Many prejudices of mine found themselves suddenly without foundation, and it became necessary to reconsider entirely my philosophy of life. I began to read voraciously. First of all the books published by the Group. “Sam” Shoemaker’s sermons, Harold Begbie’s “Life Changers,” “For Sinners Only,” etc. Then I started on those written by other Christians outside the Group, such as Leslie Weatherhead, Maude Royden, Studdert-Kennedy, and Stanley Jones. My eyes grew round with amazement when I saw how much there was to know about the old Christian message; how many ways there were of applying it to our modern conditions; and how many great minds and noble natures had tried to live a life of which I had only recently learned the existence.

But even so, those books did not satisfy me, nor did the services in the “low” Episcopalian Church which I attended appeal to me as the fullest expression of what I felt lying inarticulate and unformed at the bottom of my heart. The Group, which I at first visited regularly, soon wearied me. For, through its own nature, it had only its challenge to offer me. Once I had accepted that I wished to learn more about the “how” and “wherefore”, it was then that I began to learn the limits of the Group.

Being continually, in a manner of speaking, punched in the same spot, had a rather hardening effect on me. I began to get accustomed to certain expressions so that they failed to rouse me, and I could listen to the most passionate pleading with an even pulse. For like the drugs we use for bodily ailments, the medicine of the soul must be taken sparingly, so as not to weaken the system.

Of course the Group realizes this and encourages “action” as an outlet for the energy which has been called forth during the meetings. This action consists of handing on the “medicine” to others. “Living religion is like a germ” according to the Group, “and if you’ve got it others will get it. If you haven’t, they won’t.”

There is a lot of truth in this, as in all sayings of the Group, yet it is a dangerous doctrine to take too literally and it certainly encourages “scalp-collecting” and “man-hunting,” while it gives rise to misunderstandings and blunders. The very thought that “winning people” is the proof of the reality of one’s faith takes away that quality of self-forgetfulness which is essential to helping others, and makes the victims of our efforts feel that it is not their interests that we have at heart but our own conquest. It also encourages a lot of amateurish tinkering where perhaps the services of a trained psychologist would be more appropriate; and it fosters a kind of religious fanaticism in very young converts, which tends to become narrow and critical and cut-and-dried as soon as the first soft radiance of its “surrender” has faded away.

Very soon I had to face the fact that notwithstanding my gratitude to the Group and my enthusiasm for their work, they could no longer supply me with those “vitamins” which cause spiritual growth. So I turned to other sources. It chanced that for the first time I was introduced to an Anglo-Catholic church, the only one in our town. To me it was a revelation. My whole life long I had hankered after the Roman Catholic Church, but being brought up a Protestant I had never been able quite to overcome the barriers which divided me from it. Now, with my new experiences slowly fading in the “light of common day,” I felt a desperate need for some “form” which would preserve what was left of it, and help me to grow in the life I had decided to follow.

In the Church I found exactly what I was looking for. The symbols and faith were the same as in the Roman Church, yet there was not that rigid barrier which the Roman Church sets up, and I had a chance to “experience” Catholicism and thus to learn to understand it. From that day on a new life unfolded itself for me. I found many an explanation to questions that heretofore had baffled me. The more I penetrated the Catholic Faith, the more my admiration for it grew. It seemed so full and many- sided and it offered so much that there I could always find the answer for some special need.

The ritual opened up the channels of my emotions, and in acts of devotion I found an outlet for my religious enthusiasm. Very soon I began to notice the effects of a practiced Catholicism. Instead of wavering between extremes of pentitence and gigantic resolutions, my devotional life became more stabilized, more human, more humorous. I learned to take things with a little salt, to mistrust sweeping statements, and to be content with growing slowly and steadily. Where “confession” in the Group had often been embarrassing, I found that confessing to a priest gave the necessary peace to my rather scrupulous conscience without incurring the dangers of exhibitionism, or running the chance of shocking or corrupting others.

In short, I began to see that all those ideas that the Group believes in can be found in the Catholic Faith, only they are not unduly stressed, and “contrary” truths are not overlooked. When I read the lives of Saints who lived ages and ages ago, I realized how crude the philosophy of the Group is, how it is a mere preliminary sketch which has yet to be worked out.

The difference between the Catholic Faith and the evangelism of the Group is the difference between a Gothic Cathedral and an emergency camp. And yet I owe it to the Group that I found the Catholic Faith. That is why I cannot hear the Group slighted without wishing to speak up for it; for perhaps they are right, and once they have awakened you, God shows you the rest. I know that it happened so with me.