Who Came First?

Susan Lawder Hyde has been doing family history research too and shares the fascination.  She has been working on Russell's family but is interested in doing some Lawder/Van Houten/Olsen/Thorsen research on their lives "on the other side", before they came to America.  I have had more than enough to do figuring out their more recent history and am much more interested personally in how their stories illuminate American times.   But Susan's got the "international Ancestry", the higher level, and it would be fun to know that part too.  I told her I'd give her my list of the emigrants/immigrants in each family.  If there's a competition, the Van Houtens are WAY the earliest, (beating even the Wolcotts I think).  Lawders are second in this focus group of Bano and Papa's grandparents' families.  The Danish Olsens and Thorsens came last, but all were here by the mid 19th c.  So, here's the line up:

From Houten, The Netherlands, comes Roelof Cornelise Van Houten (1628-1672).  I don't know the exact date, but Roeloff C came over early enough to get married in Rennselaerswyck, New Netherlands (Albany, NY) in 1643 to Gerritje Van Ness, born in Emberland, Netherlands.  (These Dutch kept great parish records.)  Both born abroad, they died in Bergen County, New Netherlands, AKA New Jersey.  No great photos on the web, but the facts about Houten are here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houten

From Ireland in 1801 comes Frederick Lawder (Papa's great-great-grandfather) and his wife Margaret Reid. (See previous post).  Lawders have been in Ireland for a long time... but originally from Scotland.

From Flensberg, Denmark in 1852, comes the young Jens Jensen Thorsen, soon known as James Thorsen.  He graduates from Naval College in 1845, then goes to California (Gold Rush?) where he becomes naturalized in San Francisco in 1852.  [My mom, Nancy, has the original naturalization paper!] Jens/James returns home to Denmark, marries Emma Bloch and has 4 children (including Bano's father James Bloch Thorsen) before emigrating for good to Chicago in 1869.  [Johnny Thorsen in Savannah has sent us some info on their crossing in 1869 and the names of the kids. ]  Denmark loses Flensberg and the rest of Schleswig Holstein to Germany after 1869 on and the Danish minority faced a dim future.  PS Flensburg today looks like a great place to visit (photo below)

From somewhere in Denmark come George Olsen and Emily Miller, Bano's maternal grandparents.  George was born in Denmark in 1825 and by 1860 was married to Emily and living with her parents in Memphis, Tenn. and in Chicago.  They are in both places for the 1860 census actually. Emily Miller was born in Denmark in 1837 and came over as a young child.  They married in 1859.

Have a go, Sues!  You're able to write right to this blog, so I hope you will.