This week I’m writing about my husband’s paternal STORM family. Although there were STORM families in the Poconos area, I haven’t been able to connect them to Bart’s family. In any case, they were on my list to research because there were STORM descendants in Pennsylvania at some point. While doing a quick survey of what the libraries had on the STORM family, I found a wonderful book called Old Dirck’s Book that had a lot of relevant family history in it for us. Today I’m writing about my husband’s 10th great grandfather, Dirck Gorris STORM. This is an old Dutch line. The line of descent goes like this: Dirck Gorris STORM to Dirck’s son Gregoris, to Gregoris’ son Thomas, to Thomas’ son Abraham, to Abraham’s daughter Rebecca. Rebecca STORM married Peter DEWITT. The line continues from Rebecca’s son John DEWITT, to John’s son Richard, to Richard’s son Frances Milo, to Frances’ son Milo Greenwood, to Milo‘s daughter Lucille. Lucille is my husband’s paternal great-grandmother.

Monroe County Historical Association

One of my early research locations in Pennsylvania was the Monroe County Historical Association in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. They had a lot of information about our Pennsylvania lines and I spent quite a bit of my time there. I found an old book on their shelves called Old Dirck’s Book. It traces Dirck STORM’s line from the “earliest recorded date” down through my husband’s Thomas STORM listed above. Here is one of the first pages of the book. Our Thomas is #11.

This old book has some wonderful maps in it. This one being one of them:

I learned from the book that Bart’s STORM family were Vikings in the earliest generations.¹ Very cool!

The STORM and MONTFOORT armorials:

Dirck’s American Adventure

Old Dirck was born shortly after his father returned from war with the Spaniards. The year was 1630.¹ Old Dirck was the fifth (in a row) in a direct line of STORM men to hold the name Dirck. I’m guessing this is why he has the nickname of “Old Dirck”, to differentiate him from the other Dirck STORM men. Dirck was born in his mother Deliana ‘s hometown of Leyden, Netherlands where his father was elected to the Leyden City Council after he returned from the war with Spain.¹

Life was good for Old Dirck growing up in the Netherlands. He chose a mercantile/trade career with his uncle as his life’s occupation and he was good at it. I’m sure the fact that Holland was in a depression factored into his decision to take up the family business but also, it was the only job available to him because of the economic depression and he was fortunate to have it. In 1655, Old Dirck married Maria VAN MONTFOORT, a hometown girl from Leyden and from a good family. They had a couple of children and by then, things had worsened in Leyden. Economic conditions were bad and Protestants were being driven out of Leyden as well. The author of Old Dirck’s Book states that families immigrating from Leyden to America at this point in time were immigrating to find better economic conditions rather than for freedom of religion but he also maintains that both were an issue in Leyden. Whether it was economics or religion, the Dutch founded the West Indie Company and began emigrating.¹

By 1660, the economic downturn was so bad that Old Dirck’s uncle started closing down stores and Old Dirck found himself suddenly unemployed during an economic downturn. His uncle was able to pull through and get him a job as a Town Clerk in a nearby town though. The location was less than optimal and the pay was dismal and soon the family found themselves looking for a different opportunity. At about this time the West Indie Company’s Nieuw Nederland colony in America was beginning to show signs of prosperity. After 1 1/2 years in Osch as a Town Clerk, Old Dirck called it quits. Old Dirck and his family returned to Leyden to say goodbye to their families there and then they set sail for Nieuw Nederland colony in America. They sailed on the ship De Vos (translates to ‘The Fox’) on 31 August 1662 from Amsterdam, Holland.¹ After 9 generations, the STORMS were leaving Holland. As it turns out, out of all the STORM brothers and sisters, only Old Dirck’s line survived.¹ That gamble on emigrating to America paid off for all of us.

(Side note for researchers: Not all researchers agree that Old Dirck was the same as the Dirck STORM from Osch. See documents at Findagrave.com.² I read through what documents were available to me and made the best decisions I could as to which information to include or exclude.)

The passenger list of the ship De Vos showed Dirck STORM “from the Mayory of Bosch” (in the Province of Utrecht, Holland, according to Get NJ website; Dirck was 32 years old at this time); his wife “Mrs. Dirck” (Maria VAN MONTFOORT STORM), and their sons “Child Dirck” (Gregoris, 6 years old), “Child Dirck” (Peter, 4 years old), and “Child Dirck” (David, 1 1/4 years old).⁴ Maria was pregnant with the couple’s 4th child as they journeyed from Holland to America. It’s presumed she lost the baby while aboard the ship because the baby is never recorded as a passenger on the ship and is never in any subsequent records of the family. Researchers have recorded the baby as a female child.⁵

Other interesting passengers of note on the ship for that voyage were the ACKERMAN family, said to best friends with the STORM family. Ammerens CLASEN, the sister of Tjerck Claesen DeWIT (Bart’s paternal 10th great grandfather). There is possibly one other CLAESEN sibling and possibly a DeWITT family member on board the ship but I did not take the time to verify these last two relationships.⁴

I wish I could convey to you how tiny the ships were on which these emigrants sailed to America. The book gives a decent description but until you’ve stepped onto a ship like what these people sailed on, you will never understand the courage it took to get here.

Today, a very small freighter is 5,000 tons; a small liner, 15,000; some – the great leviathans- top 80,000….

The Mayflower of the Pilgrims was only 180 tons…”Santa Maria”…100 tons; “Nina” and “Pinta”, each 60.

Old Dirck’s Book.¹

180 tons at most on the vast ocean. It gives me shivers just thinking about it! If my family had depended on me to emigrate on a “ship” like that we’d still be in a foreign country!! They were on little sailboats basically. But they made it!

As they were nearing land in their new country on 14 November 1662,⁶ the white beaches of New Jersey and Long Island came into view. The narrow strand of Sandy Hook led into the Nieuw Amsterdam harbor where they would finally land. On the starboard side was “Langh Eylandt” – better known today as Long Island. Upon arriving, Old Dirck abandoned the heraldic arms of his family and chose a new personal seal.¹ A brand new start in a brand new country. That appeals to me. I love his spirit!

He eliminated the fishes…and substituted a storm-tossed ship at sea…borne on a shield similar to the one in the family’s ancient coat-of-arms, topped by a helmet and a pair of wings…Dirck took for his motto an old Dutch word “Vertrouwt” which means “Have Trust”.

Old Dirck’s Book.¹

Life in the New World

Despite being one of the “earliest of American scholars”,⁷ Old Dirck had a difficult start in the new country and he bounced around Nieuw Amsterdam (the present-day area of New York City)⁸ for awhile. When Old Dirck first arrived in Nieuw Amsterdam, he rented a house owned by Elizabeth VAN DRIESSEN. He had considerable trouble finding work and was unable to pay the rent for the house so after 2 years, he moved out (in 1665). He moved to a less expensive home on Beaver Street where he opened a tavern.⁹ (See the yellow circle on the map below.)

Mrs. VAN DRIESSEN claimed he moved out “by stealth” and she sued him for back rent. Unfortunately for Old Dirck, the tavern wasn’t enough to provide for his family either. However, Carel DE BEVOISE, someone who was an old family friend from Old Dirck’s days back in Holland, offered Old Dirck a job in 1669 as the Assistant Town Clerk in a little town called Breuckelen (better known to you as the present-day borough of Brooklyn). Old Dirck took the offer and moved his growing family to Breuckelen. Less than a year later, Old Dirck’s good friend Carel died and Old Dirck took over the Town Clerk job that Carel had before he passed away. Old Dirck took over the Town Clerk position on 15 December 1669. While he was Town Clerk, he bought a farm at Bedford and then another farm at Nieuw Lots. He moved to Nieuw Lots in 1677 and became Town Clerk of nearby Flakbosch (now known as Flatbush).⁹ While in Nieuw Lots he also taught the young Dutch children in a little log cabin for four years.¹⁰ You can see these three towns on the map below along with two other places of importance to Old Dirck that are circled in red.

By 1691, Long Island was becoming too anglicized for the STORM families. Old Dirck’s children were grown and living on their own. That year he was invited to go to the newly formed Orange County, New York as the County Secretary and Clerk of the Courts. He accepted the invitation and, at age 61, he hopped in a canoe, crossed the East River, went around the tip of Manhattan, and up the Hudson River to Orange County.⁹

Old Dirck took office in a log courthouse at Tappan, New York, in the forest on Sparkill Creek. He stayed there until 1703 when he retired at age 73. Meanwhile, after Dirck took the job at Tappan the majority of his children (including Bart’s ancestor, Gregoris) moved to the opposite side of the Hudson to Philipse Manor in Westchester County, New York, directly across the river from Tappan. This is now the Sleepy Hollow area of New York and also the place where Bart’s family intermarried with the VAN TASSEL family (as in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow because yes- the VAN TASSELs were real and Washington IRVING decided to put one of them in his novel!).⁹

Winding Down a Life

Retirement didn’t mean that Old Dirck stopped doing things. He chose to live out the remainder of his years with his two younger sons, Peter and David, in Yonkers, New York, rather than with Gregoris in Philipsburg, New York. After his retirement the Dutch Reformed Church in Sleepy Hollow invited Old Dirck to compile their records and he accepted.⁹ (One newspaper article states that Old Dirck was the first Parish Clerk at the Sleepy Hollow church and was keeping church records as early as 1697.¹¹) The records were written in Dutch. “The First Record Book” was published on 3 November 1715 when Old Dirck was 85 years old. On 17 April 1716 Old Dirck signed the 8th and last book of records of the church. It was also the last record of Old Dirck. In spite of the many records he had created and maintained in his lifetime, there is no record of Old Dirck’s death. It is assumed he died in 1716 at age 86.⁹ Gregoris, his son and Bart’s direct ancestor, had died 5 years earlier at the age of 55. Thomas, Bart’s direct ancestor and the son of Gregoris, was 14 years old when he lost his dad and 19 when he lost his grandfather (Old Dirck) thus making Thomas the head of the family at age 19. In between ages 14 and 19, Thomas got married. At age 17, he married Christina VAN WEERT.¹

At the end of his life, Old Dirck was buried in the Old Dutch Burial Ground in Sleepy Hollow, Westchester County, New York.¹² You may sometimes see his burial location as Tarrytown because this was the name of the town before it was changed to Sleepy Hollow.¹³ His son, Gregoris (Bart’s 9th great grandfather), is also buried there in the Old Dutch Burial Ground and has a shared stone with his father, Old Dirck.¹⁴

Thomas (Old Dirck’s grandson and Gregoris’ son and Bart’s 8th great grandfather) is buried at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery nearby.¹⁶

Thomas’ son Abraham (Bart’s 7th great grandfather) also lived in Tarrytown (aka Sleepy Hollow) and Abraham’s daughter Rebecca STORM DEWITT lived in Tarrytown for a time as well.⁵

Final Thoughts

I highly recommend a trip to Sleepy Hollow, New York, if you can swing it. It’s on my bucket list for sure! You can visit the Old Dutch Church and Burial Ground as well as the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. They’re right next to each other. If you can’t go there, you can look online. You can find information at the Visit Sleepy Hollow website.¹⁷ You can also do an internet search for Old Dutch Church videos and Sleepy Hollow walking tour videos. There are some good videos out there that will give you a good idea of what the terrain and town look like. If you do get to go, do some pre-trip research. There are preserved properties that are important to the STORM family history that you can tour. You wouldn’t want to miss it! Plus there’s an entire town named for our STORM family – Stormville, New York!

I hope you’ve enjoyed learning about Old Dirck STORM. Every time I say his name I think of Bart’s Aunt Jean who always called our son (Derek) ‘Dirk’. I guess since Dirck translates to Derek she got it mostly right. Enjoy the final day of your weekend and remember to love your people.

Until next time,

Lisa @ Days of Our Lives blog

Resources

1. Storm, Raymond William. Old Dirck’s Book.
2. Findagrave.com. Entry for Dirck Storm. Accessed 16 July 2022.
3. GetNJ.com. Accessed on 16 July 2022.
4. ImmigrantShips.net. Accessed on 16 July 2022.
5. Ancestry.com. Accessed on 15 July 2022.
6. New Amsterdam History Center website. Accessed on 16 July 2022.
7. “At Sleepy Hollow. The Historic Old Dutch Church Still Stands”. Kansas Agitator, Garnett, Kansas. 15 Feb 1901, Page 7. Accessed online at Newspapers.com on 16 July 2022.
8. Wikipedia entry for New Amsterdam. Accessed on 15 July 2022.
9. Cassidy, Henry. Catharyna Brett: Portrait of a Colonial Businesswoman. Collections of the Dutchess County Historical Society, New York. Vol 13, 1992. Found online at the ISSUU website. Accessed on 15 July 2022.
10. Rootsweb.com. Accessed 16 July 2022.
11. “Sleepy Hollow Records”. New-York Tribune, New York, New York. 6 Jan 1901, Page 49. Accessed online at Newspapers.com on 16 July 2022.
12. Findagrave.com. Additional entry for Dirck Storm. Accessed 16 July 2022.
13. Wikipedia entry for Sleepy Hollow, New York. Accessed on 16 July 2022.
14. Findagrave.com. Entry for Gregoris Storm. Accessed 16 July 2022.
15. Findagrave.com. Entry for Dirck Storm. Accessed 16 July 2922.
16. Findagrave.com. Entry for Thomas Storm. Accessed 16 July 2022.
17. Visit Sleepy Hollow website. Accessed on 16 July 2022.