One who sought the distinction of the title of a Patroon (or Patron) of New Netherlands was entitled to hold as a perpetual inheritance, handing it down in the line of the oldest son, an estate having sixteen miles frontage on one side of a navigable river or eight miles on each side, extending as far into the country as the occupiers would permit. The Patroon must obtain Indian title, which usually cost but a trifle. He was empowered to hold civil and criminal courts on his estate and his decisions were practically final. He appointed the officers and magistrates in all the cities and towns in his territory. In order to be invested with this honor, these privileges and powers, he bound himself to take or send over at least fifty emigrants over fifteen years of age to settle on his patent within the next four years.
The emigrants taken or sent by the Patroons to New Netherlands were bound for a specified number of years as apprentices to serve their masters, agreeing not to hunt or fish without the master’s permission, agreeing to grind their grain in his mill and pay his price for grinding. They were pledged not to weave any cloth for themselves or others, but to buy it from the company under the penalty of banishment. They were bound to pay rent in everything they produced. The Patroon and his emigrants were to support a schoolmaster, a minister and a comforter for the sick.
Such in brief was the Patroon system.
The most desirable locations for selections in the New Netherlands were along the Hudson and Delaware rivers, known, of course, by the directors of the Dutch West India Company; prominent among them was Kiliaen Van Rensselaer, a wealthy dealer in diamonds and pearls in Amsterdam.
Van Rensselaer, doubtless, informed of the great advantages of Albany, as the great rendezvous of the Indians to market their furs and near the confluence of the two most important rivers of New York, instructed his agents to obtain title from the Indians and he succeeded in procuring a princely estate along the Hudson river above and below Albany, a distance of twenty-four miles and extending east and west forty-eight miles—a territory ample for a kingdom—greater than the area of North Holland and very little less than that of South Holland.
Other directors of the Dutch West India Company promptly made what they thought the most desirable locations along the Hudson river. Manhattan Island (New York) being reserved by the company, and along the Delaware—immense tracts, though none so extensive as Van Rensselaer’s, and became Patroons. Such grants and under such circumstances soon excited jealousy and sharp criticism in Holland and the Patroons felt compelled to make concessions and yield some of their privileges.
Kiliaen Van Rensselaer was a man of energy and executive ability, and strove to increase the growth, importance, and prosperity of Rensselaerwyck in accordance with the Patroon system. It has been said that he visited his estate in the New Netherlands in 1637, but no proof has been found and the report is discredited. A distant landlord frequently is in ignorance, and sometimes designedly kept so, of the actual state of affairs in his estate, which would be remedied if he were present. The Patroon was represented in New Netherlands, when absent, by agents, partners, or directors. Kiliaen admitted into a limited partnership in his estate three prominent members of the Amsterdam Chamber of the Dutch West India Company, namely, Samuel Godyn, Johannes de Laet, and Samuel Blommaert, in order the sooner and more effectively to present to the public the attractions of Rensselaerwyck, and, presumably, also to abate the ill feeling against him in the Netherlands for his having taken advantage of his position to secure such an immense estate. Van Rensselaer dominated that partnership and again became sole proprietor. Kiliaen died in 1646 and his son, Johannes, then a minor, under the right of primogeniture, became Patroon and continued to be until 1658, when he died. His interests in Rensselaerwyck were cared for at first by Van Slechtenhorst, or until 1652, and then by the Patroon’s half brother, Jan Baptiste.
In 1658 Jeremias, the second son of Kiliaen, became director and subsequently proprietor of Rensselaerwyck and was the first of the Patroons to reside in, or even visit, the estate in New Netherlands.
There were eight of the Van Rensselaers called Patroons, namely and in the order of primogeniture except in the case of Jeremias:
First.—Kiliaen, from 1629 to 1646.