Thomas Hall came to the South River in 1635, in the employ of an Englishman, named Mr. Homs, being the same who intended to take Fort Nassau at that time and rob us of the South River. This Thomas Hall ran away from his master, came to the Manhatans and hired himself as a farmer's man to Jacob van Curlur. Becoming a freeman he has made a tobacco plantation upon the land of Wouter van Twyler, and he has been also a farm-superintendent; and this W. van Twyler knows the fellow. Thomas Hall dwells at present upon a small bowery belonging to the Honorable Company.
Elbert Elbertsen came to the country as a farmer's boy at about ten or eleven years of age, in the service of Wouter van Twyler, and has never had any property in the country. About three years ago he married the widow of Gerret Wolphertsen, (brother of the before mentioned Jacob van Couwenhoven,) and from that time to this has been indebted to the Company, and would be very glad to get rid of paying.
Govert Loockmans, brother in law of Jacob van Couwenhoven, came to New Netherland in the yacht St. Martin in the year 1633 as a cook's mate, and was taken by Wouter van Twyler into the service of the Company, in which service he profited somewhat. He became a freeman, and finally took charge of the trading business for Gilles Verbruggen and his company in New Netherland. This Loockmans ought to show gratitude to the Company, next to God, for his elevation, and not advise its removal from the country.
Hendrick Kip is a tailor, and has never suffered any injury in New Netherland to our knowledge.
Jan Evertsen-Bout, formerly an officer of the Company, came the last time in the year 1634, with the ship Eendracht [Union], in the service of the Honorable Michiel Paauw, and lived in Pavonia until the year 1643, and prospered tolerably. As the Honorable Company purchased the property of the Heer Paauw, the said Jan Evertsen succeeded well in the service of the Company, but as his house and barn at Pavonia were burnt down in the war, he appears to take that as a cause for complaint. It is here to be remarked, that the Honorable Company, having paid 26,000 guilders for the colony of the Heer Paauw, gave to the aforesaid Jan Evertsen, gratis, long after his house was burnt, the possession of the land upon which his house and farmstead are located, and which yielded good grain. The land and a poor unfinished house, with a few cattle, Michiel Jansen has bought for eight thousand guilders.
In brief, these people, to give their doings a gloss, say that they are bound by oath and compelled by conscience; but if that were the case they would not assail their benefactors, the Company and others, and endeavor to deprive them of this noble country, by advising their removal, now that it begins to be like something, and now that there is a prospect of the Company getting its own again. And now that many of the inhabitants are themselves in a better condition than ever, this is evidently the cause of the ambition of many, etc.
At the Hague, 29th November, 1650.
LETTER OF JOHANNES BOGAERT TO HANS BONTEMANTEL, 1655
Letter of Johannes Bogaert to Hans Bontemantel, 1655. In J. Franklin Jameson, ed., Narratives of New Netherland, 1609-1664 (Original Narratives of Early American History). NY: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1909.