Hendrick Christiaensen

Dutch explorer

Hendrick Christiaensen was a Dutch explorer who was involved in the earlier exploration of what became the colony of New Netherland.

Life

New Netherland series
Exploration
Fortifications:
Fort Amsterdam Fort Nassau (North) Fort Orange Fort Nassau (South) Fort Goede Hoop De Wal Fort Casimir Fort Altena Fort Wilhelmus Fort Beversreede Fort Nya Korsholm De Rondout
Settlements:
Noten Eylandt Nieuw Amsterdam Rensselaerswijck Nieuw Haarlem Beverwijck Wiltwijk Bergen Pavonia Vriessendael Achter Col Vlissingen Oude Dorpe Colen Donck Greenwich Heemstede Rustdorp Gravesende Breuckelen Nieuw Amersfoort Midwout Nieuw Utrecht Boswijk Swaanendael Nieuw Amstel Nieuw Dorp
The Patroon System
Charter of Freedoms and Exemptions
Cornelius Jacobsen May (1620–25) Willem Verhulst (1625–26) Peter Minuit (1626–32) Sebastiaen Jansen Krol (1632–33) Wouter van Twiller (1633–38) Willem Kieft (1638–47) Peter Stuyvesant (1647–64)
People of New Netherland
New Netherlander Twelve Men Eight Men Nine Men
Flushing Remonstrance

v t e

Hendrick Christiaensen was a ship captain and trader employed by the Van Tweenhuysen Company of Amsterdam.^[1]

In 1611 Christiaensen paid two visits to Manhattan in his ship Fortuyn, including one with fellow explorer Adriaen Block in his Tyger. Upon his return to the Dutch Republic in 1612, he brought back with him two young Native Americans who were the sons of a local sachem. The Dutch were fascinated with the boys, whom they called Orson and Valentine Christiaensen.

In 1613 Christiaensen and Block returned in the two vessels,^[2] and created the first map of the region that showed Manhattan and Long Island as separate geographical entities.

Fort Nassau

In 1614 Christiensen sailed the Fortuyn up the North River to Castle Island (New York), where he built a warehouse on the ruins of an old abandoned French fur trader's fort. He added a stockade and a moat eighteen feet wide.^[3] He named it Fort Nassau in honor of stadtholder Maurice of Nassau. The river, sometimes known as the Mauritius was also named after Maurice. Christiensen took two cannon and eleven swivel guns from the Fortuyn and left twelve men under the command of Jacob Eelkens, before returning downriver.

In the spring of 1619 Christiaensen's ship, the Swarte Beer, was lying in the Hudson River when his ship was surprised by Indians. In the attack Hendrick Christiaensen and the greater part of his crew were killed. The survivors succeeded in driving away the Indians from the ship by two shots from the guns.^[4]

References

Footnotes

^ Hallowell, Christopher L., "Journey of a Seventeenth-Century Cannon", Natural History, April 1976
^ "Ships from Amsterdam Holland to New Netherland New York".
^ Joyce, John St. George. Story of Philadelphia, Rex print. house, Philadelphia , PA 1919
^ Hart, Simon. "The Pre-History of the New Netherlands Company", City of Amsterdam Press, 1959^{[permanent dead link]}