Laurent de Camps, Chief Surgeon of the King’s Hospitals at Maubeuge. Arms: On a shield azure three trefoils, gold, 2 and 1. (Flanders, vol. 12, fol. 1438.)
Etienne des Camps, scribe of the king at the gallery called La Forte. Arms: On a shield azure a crescent gold between two towers silver, placed front, three stars gold ranged in chief, and three ducks, also gold, ranged in point, swimming on a river of silver. (Provence, vol. 29, pt. i., fol. 668.)
Jacques de Camps, bourgeois. Arms: On a shield azure two towers silver, jointed sable, accompanied in point by a dog, gold, running after a hare, gold, on a meadow, silver, and a chief gules charged with three gold stars. (Provence, vol. 29, pt. i., fol. 818.)
Bertrand de Camps, Procureur Audit of Parleement; Capitoul (municipal officer of Toulouse). Arms: On a shield azure a chevron gules, accompanied in chief by dots azure, and in point by a lion of sable, tongued and armed gules and a chief, azure, charged with three silver stars. (Toulouse, vol. 14, pt. i., fol. 137.)
Pierre de Camps, esquire, Seigneur de Clairbourg, and former body guard to the king, Valet of the Wardrobe to Monsieur (the Dauphin). Arms: On a shield azure a chevron gules, accompanied by three merlets of sable.
From the above facts it will be noted that there existed a large family of Protestant “De Camps” at Montauban between 1625–1675; a great Catholic family of “Du Campe” at Boulogne between 1600–1780, and an indication of “De Camps” at Rouen. Perhaps a clue to the ancestry of the New Jersey “De Camp” family may lurk about that Laurent De Camps who was Chief Surgeon at Mauberge and that Laurent De Camps who was Sieur de Bernoville in 1746. The fact of a Maurice Descamps being a witness to the marriage of his brother Jean Descamps and Catherine Delarre on 28 September, 1681, may also be important, as this Maurice was a son of Jean and Margueritte (Chevalier) Descamps, deceased in 1681, and it will hereafter be seen that the name of Morris is a favored one in the early New Jersey De Camp families.
The purpose of the present work is to trace and record the descendants of “Laurens Jansen De Camp,”[[3]] a French Huguenot, who arrived in this country about 1664, and appears to have been the first and only one of his name who came to the shores of the New Netherlands.
1 Laurence2 De Camp, the son of John1 De Camp, was probably born either in the province of Picardie or Normandy about 1645. He arrived at New Amsterdam in 1664, in company with other Huguenots, from Holland; but the name of the vessel in which he crossed the ocean is unknown. Dr. Charles W. Baird, in his “History of the Huguenot Refugees in America,” states that his fellow-emigrants were Antoine du Chaine, Nicolas de La Plaine, Jean de la Warde, all of Normandy; and Simon Bouclé, Jacques Monier, Pierre Monier, Gedeon Merlet, Jacques Cossart, and Jean Paul de Rues. In the early Dutch church records he is repeatedly called “Laurens Jansen,”[[4]] but in 1687 his full name, “Laurens Jansen De Camp,” appears on the Kings County, N. Y., rolls.
He must have been quite young at the date of his emigration for he married about 1676 Elsie de Mandeville, daughter of Gillis and Altje (Hendricks) de Mandeville[[5]] (also written Mandeviel), and had most if not all his children born within the period of from 1676–1696. In the Assessment Roll of New Utrecht made up 24th August, 1675, his name appears as “Laurens Jansen 1 Pole, 2 Horses, 2 Cows, £52; 24 Morgens of Land £48; Total; £100;” and in the Assessment Roll of the same place made up 29th September, 1676, he appears as “Laurens Jansen 1 Pole; 2 Horses; 2 Cows; £52; 12 Morgens of Land; £24; Total £76.”
In 1677 the names “Laurens Jansen and wife” appear in a list of church members at New Utrecht, N. Y., and he undoubtedly lived at this place from 1664 to 1688, for on the 26th September, 1687, his name appears on a list of these inhabitants of Kings County, N. Y., who took the oath of allegiance to England as follows: “Lawrens Janse De Camp 23 Jaere” (Doc. Hist. of N. Y., vol. I., p. 415), (that is, he had been in New Netherlands 23 years) of New Utrecht, N. Y. Shortly after this date he must have removed to Staten Island, N. Y., where there was a large Huguenot settlement and a French church established as early as 1680. On 30th December, 1701, he joined in a Petition of the Protestants of New York to King William III. (N. Y. Col. Mss., vol. IV., p. 942), entitled “A list of the majr part of the freeholders and inhabitants of Richmond County” “Johannes de Campe; Larrens de Campe.” The John De Camp here mentioned was his eldest son. In 1719, May 7th, he was Local Pastor of the Staten Island Dutch Church. On 20 June, 1679 “Laurens Janz & Altie Gillis” his wife, were the witnesses at baptism of Maria, the child of Antoine Du Chesne and Anna Bocque at Flatbush, N. Y. On 5th May, 1688, Laurens Jansen and Altie Gillis, his wife, were the witnesses at baptism of Angenetie, child of Hendrik Jansen Cammega and Anna Maria Vervele at Flatbush, N. Y.