Isaac Herman Opdengraeff

• Parents: Herman Isacks OpdenGraeff (1585 - 1642) & Greitjen Pletjes OpdenGraeff (1588 - 1643)
• Born: 28 Feb 1616, Krefeld Germany
• Marriage: Greitjen Margaret Peters
• Had 4 children who emigrated to what is now Pennsylvania: Margaret, Herman, Abraham, and Dirck.
• Died: 16 Jan 1669, Krefeld Germany at age 52

Immigration to America

Herman Op Den Graeff in the U.S. and Canada, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index. Name: Herman Isaacs Op DeGraef Arrival Year: 1683 Arrival Place: Germantown, Pennsylvania, Source Publication Code: 6041, Primary Immigrant: DeGraef, Herman Isaacs Op Annotation: A proclamation of William Penn declaring Francis Daniel Pastorius and 61 other foreigners freemen of the Province of Pennsylvania. From the Rolls Office, Philadelphia, now in the Juniata College Library, Huntington, Pennsylvania. Also in no. 9143, Tepper.

• Source Bibliography: NATURALIZATIONS, GERMANTOWN, PA. 3/7/1691/92; Copia Naturalisationis of Francis Daniel Pastorius and of 61 Persons More of German Town from William Penn, Esq." In National Genealogical Society Quarterly, vol. 28:1 (Mar. 1940), pp. 7-8. Page: 7

Married

• Married: Greitjen (Margaret) Peters after 1636 in Gladbach, present-day Germany. She was born ca. 1620 in Krefeld. She died Nov 19, 1683 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania around the age of 63, enroute to the Germantown settlement. Isaac Hermans op den Graeff, b. in 1616, married Grietjen Peters (d. 1679), was converted with his family to Quakerism. His widow, who died in Philadelphia 19 October 1683, his three sons Derick (Dirk) Isaacs, Herman Isaacs, and Abraham Isaacs, and a daughter Margrit (m. later to Peter Schumacher, immigrant from Kriegsheim who arrived in 1685) emigrated to Germantown as part of the 13 famous first families on the Concord, arriving at Philadelphia, 6 October 1683, settling in Germantown soon thereafter.

Children

• Adolphus /Op den Graeff/ b. aft. 1636, d. bef. 1654
• Herman Isaacs /Op den Graeff/ b. 1642, married 1st, Liesbet Isacks van Bebber and 2nd, Debora van Bebber, d. 1701
• Dirck Isaacks /Op de Graeff/ b. bef. 1642, married Noleken Vijten on Mar 20, 1681, d. before May 24, 1697. No children
• Margaretta (Mary) op den Graeff - b. ca. 1643, married Johannes Yelles Peter Cassel, III, d. November 08, 1728
• Abraham Isaacs /Op den Graeff/+ b. ca. 1646, married Catharine (Trijnte) Jansen on Jul 23, 1679, d. Mar 27, 1731

Op Den Graeff Family History

Op den Graeff, also Updegraff, Updegrave, Updegrove, Uptegrove, was a Germano-Dutch and American family. Pictured in the coat of arms is the Lohengrin Swan. The earliest Op den Graeffs lived in Aldekerk (Kleve), near the border to the Netherlands. An old family history said that the family sprang out from the Von Graben.(1) This was first published in the work Germania topo-chrono-stemmatographica sacra et profana (or Genealogica Germaniae Notitia). These are works of Gabriel Bucelin (or Buccelini, Bincelint), which were published in 1652/62. DeGraeff was formerly the VonGROBER/GROBEN family. this family today shows the same coat-of-arms as the DeGraeff's. During the 17th century the Op den Graeffs were a family of linen weavers in Krefeld and continued this occupation later in Germantown, although the family purchased jointly 2,000 acres of land in Germantown. The Op den Graeff family were said to be tall and spare (thin) in physique and have strongly marked features. The founder of the Opdengraeff line, Herman, was a wealthy weaver and merchant and a Mennonite leader and bishop, one of the signers of the 1632 Mennonite Confession of Faith. He appears to have been an extreme mystic with more than a touch of egomania. Both he and his wife were born to Mennonite families as yet few in number in a group of villages on the border between Germany and Holland, these families were closely interrelated. Oddly for a prosperous and religiously ascetic merchant's family able to put stained glass windows in their house which stood for a very long time. This house contained notorious stained glass windows full of hymns (partly to himself) and mystical religious symbolism, some of it Catholic. A window from his house, now in the Krefeld Museum, says in German "To be God-fearing, devout and of good morals; zealous, hospitable and truthful in speech--is Christian, and pleases the Lord; brings favor, and sets many a one to great honor. Herman op Den Graff und greitgen lein hoffrow. A 1630."(2, 3) devout and good to all sides.” Almost half of his eighteen children did not live long enough to see age two; most of those who died did not live to see age one. Herman and his wife moved to Krefeld in 1609. Herman was one of two delegates of the Krefeld Mennonite Church to sign the Dordrecht Confession in 1632 and served as preacher in the congregation at Krefeld. A certain Reformed member in the Morses Synod bitterly complained that "some simple non-Mennonites felt themselves drawn". In 1637, contributions were requested for the oppressed Reformed Church in Sweebrucke, Herman contributed from his own means in the name of the small Krefeld congregation 25 Reich Thanker, while the Reformed Congregation in Krefeld contributed only 22. From the vast forest of Genealogyland, there is new evidence that Hermen Op Den Graff (1585 - 1642), the celebrated Bishop of the Krefeld Mennonites and a Signer of the Dordrecht Confession of 1632, was a Morganatic (or natural son) of John William De La Marck (1562 - 1609), the Graeff Von Alten (Count of Altena). This particular John William De La Marck is listed as the younger son and heir of William V of Cleves (1516 - 1592) and Mary of Habsburg (1530 - 1584), who was the Princess Imperial, Princess of the Romans and Duchess of Cleves, daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand I of Habsburg (1503 - 1564), niece of Charles V of Habsburg (1500 - 1558), the Holy Roman Emperor who presided over the sufferings of the Reformation. This paragraph’s genealogy of the op den Graeffs stems from the Scheuten Manuscripts, a private Scheuten family history allegedly written by Adam Scheuten (1639-1668) or his son [sic] Abraham Scheuten (1707-1789), though the actual authorship appears unknown. This history exists in several versions without any documentation or sources named to support the genealogy. There is the suspicion that this manuscript was contrived to invent a royal ancestry for the op den Graeff family. It was before 1609 when the armistice between the Netherlands and Spain took place, when the Mennonite family op den Graefff left Kempen and Aldekerk (Lower Rhine) and settled at Krefeld, where they were tolerated under the reign of Prince Moritz of Orange. Alderkerk, GE (about 12 miles from Krefeld). Krefeld, GE (a small town of handicraftmen). Herman was a Linen weaver and merchant. He was born at Aldekirk/Allekirche some 12 miles from Krefeld. He was a burgher of Kempen in 1605 where he married. He moved to Krefeld by about 1608. He is the first Mennonite preacher known by name. He was the father of eighteen children.(4) In Krefeld the family belong to the Mennonite circle, which turned Quaker in part ca. 1679-1680. In the end of the 17th century some of the Op den Graeff’s descendants migrated to the United States. The 13 counted families that boarded the Concord departed from London on July 24, 1683, and arrived safely in Philadelphia on October 6 1683 and are among the passengers listed below. They are among the thirteen families (Original 13) often referred to as the Germantown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Founders, who arrived on the ship Concord on October 6, 1683.(5, 6, 7) One of these was famous Abraham op den Graeff, a cousin of William Penn, who signed along with three others the first organized religious petition against slavery in the colonies, the 1688 Germantown Quaker Petition Against Slavery.(8) In 1681, William Penn had been granted land in America from the King of England*(9), and began a search for candidates to inhabit his new world. Penn was looking for righteous, pious, God-fearing men and their families to fulfill his dream of a land where people were free to worship without fear of retribution. This noble project was referred to by Penn as his "Holy Experiment". He encountered the German people in the lower Rhine Valley, who were in need of relief from oppression, hostility, and religious persecution, and found they filled his requirements for religious, moral, and economic status perfectly. As a result, 13 families from the lower Rhine region were invited by William Penn to come to the new land of opportunity, to be a part of the creation of a new type of world... at last, freedom of worship... in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. These are the families who we now refer to as "The Original 13". The Original 13 "Krefelders", who set sail in July 1683 and arrived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in October, 1683 on the Concord(10), are considered to be the first "group" or mass-emigration to America. They were also the original settlers of Germantown, Pennsylvania. Three Op Den Graeff brothers were in this group, i.e. Herman, Derik and Abraham.(11) The Founding of Germantown The Concord landed in Philadelphia on October 6, 1683, a mere seven weeks after setting sail from the town of Crefeld (pronounced approximately Kray-feld) in the lower Rhine River valley of Germany. Would this little group of thirty-three persons from twelve families really initiate a revolution in the New World? Their ship’s name was prophetic: Concord is derived from the 17th century Latin motto of the Netherlands, which translates, “Concord makes small things flourish.” The Voyage on the Concord The Concord was a wooden vessel 130 feet long and 32 feet wide. She carried 180 passengers, thirty to forty sailors, and twenty-six cannon. Captain Jeffries had sailed to America seven or eight times, and was friendly and polite. The weather was calm on the voyage. Our passengers were all from the town of Crefeld, weavers by occupation. Today’s, Krefeld is a major German industrial center noted for its steel, chemical and textile plants, and has some 235,000 inhabitants. When the Concord landed, Pennsylvania’s Proprietor, William Penn. was on hand to greet the new colonists. Not long thereafter, they were also welcomed by Francis Pastorius, who helped them to settle in this new land. He worked with Penn to secure the property that Penn had promised to Krefelders and Quakers. Pastorius negotiated for the settlers with William Penn for the location of the German land grant. The immigrants had wanted to buy land in a flat location along a navigable stream for easy transport. But such a location was not suitable because nearby land (like today’s Manayunk and Roxborough) was too hilly for farming. Many of the 13 families spent their first winter in the New World in hastily constructed homes in caves on the banks of the Delaware River. They roofed these crude cavities over with boards from nearby trees to provide protection against the cold and snow. The Original Krefelder Families Who were these immigrants? Were they really Quakers? Mt. Airy scholar J.M. Duffin tells us that the Krefelders were German-speaking and originally Dutch-speaking Germans Quakers. Their settlement here in Mt. Airy and Germantown was part of a struggle for human freedom not witnessed before. They wanted to create a new community based on their individual worth and responsibility. They sought to rule themselves here in Germantown. They wanted a little country of their own where they could worship in German without fear. Unlike Pastorius, these people were not wealthy, but were skilled craftsmen who knew they would have to work hard to survive. By trade, they were carpenters, weavers, dyers, tailors and shoemakers. During the first year, they had to clear land and plant crops for food and flax for weaving. Fifty ships had landed in Philadelphia by 1683. By 1689, Germantown was a thriving little community of 44 families, built on the original 13 Krefelder families.(12) Abraham op den Graeffs descendants named Opdegraf(f), Updegraf(f), Uptagraff(t), Updegrave, Updegrove, Updegraph and Upthegrove. Pennsylvania Governor Samuel Whitaker Pennypacker was the fourth great-grandson of Abraham.(13) Some of their descendants continued in or returned to the Mennonite faith and were found in the Montgomery County congregations of Skippack and Boyertown until modern times. During the earlier 19th century David Benjamin Updegraff of the Updegraff branch of the family was a conductor (one of the leaders) of the Underground Railroad. He was one of the first outspoken anti-slavery men, and voted with the first liberty party from conscientious convictions. His house was the home of antislavery advocates and temperance lecturers also a station on the Underground Railroad. Another alleged part of the family settled in the area of Bad Kreuznach, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany(14). The family still live until now. The Father of Herman is often given (WITHOUT PROOF) as Abraham op den Graf, with family lineages as follows: 1) FREDERIKUS DE GROBEN, m. 1359 CATHARINE DE SOMMEROCK 2) LEONARDUS DE GROBEN, m. 1441 MARIA DE NORTHEIN 3) Ernetus DE GROBEN (d. 1510), m. 1508 Margarethe DE RITSCHES 3) Virgilina DE GROBEN (1467 - 1507) 3) WOLFGANGUS DE GROBEN 4) Pieter OP DEN GRAEFF (aft 1483 - ), m. Grietz Pietrazs BERENTS 4) ABRAHAM OP DEN GRAF (1490 - 1561 Dusseldorf, Germany) Cf. Donna N. Basinger, Clymer Connections, RootsWeb's WorldConnect Project, 22 May 2000. Cf. June (Shaull) Lutz 1988, History of the Op den Graef/Updegraff Family, pp. U-1/U-2. From a 17th century document. Unproven as father of Herman op den Graeff. Abraham was a Protestant reformer (1561) of Zwammerdam, Holland, whose lands were seized by the Catholic church. He and his family escaped to Antwerp, but persecution of Protestants drove them to Germany. After his death his widow moved to Krefeld.(15) Alternatively: Two painted glass windows(16), circa 1630, from the home of Herman op den Graeff are preserved in the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum in Krefeld. G. W. Miller 1991, "Reconstructing the Op Den Graff windows of 1630 A.D. to fit the Lohengrin Genealogy of the House of Cleves," Krefeld Immigrants and Their Descendants, vol. 8, #1, pp. 9-28. Interpretation of heraldic symbols on the op den Graff windows implies that Herman op den Graeff was the son of John William de la Marck, Count of Altena, and a woman not of the nobility. The morganatic mother of Herman has been TENTATIVELY identified as Anna Van Aldekerk (Dutch) or Anne de Aldekerk (French) or Anna Cloister of Aldekerk, perhaps a former nun. In the context of royalty, a morganatic marriage is a marriage between people of unequal social rank, which prevents the passage of the husband's titles and privileges to the wife and any children born of the marriage.

sources: (1) Family Tree (2) Family Motto, op Herman op den Graeff and his wife Greitgen (Greitje) Pletjes: God is fruitful, devout and good to all sides. By Unknown - Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8017390 (3) Translated from the German and appearing in Wild Rhododendrons, http://wildrohodes.blogspot.com (4) Letter, Dorothea Schweiger (file); Krefeld Imm V 4 #1 pg 10; Op Den Graeff, v 1 LKS film 1036920 #3; Pennsylvania Folk Life V3 #8, paragraphs 4-7 (5) "The Friend, Volume 48", The Friend., 1875. Harvard University. p. 67 (6) "Ship Passengers Mentioned in Merion MM Minutes; Chester County, PA.", Yvonne Prough. U.S. Genealogical Web Archives. Accessed 29 sept 2011 (7) "1683 Concord", Pro Genealogists. Accessed 29 sept 2011 (8) Family Motto, op Herman op den Graeff and his wife Greitgen (Greitje) Pletjes: God is fruitful, devout and good to all sides. By Unknown - Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8017390 (9) William Penn’s 1681 Pamphlet, The Original 13, Settlers of Germantown Pennsylvania, ancestry.com (10) The Concord, 1683, Concord artwork by German American Artist Richard Schlect, 1982, Courtesy Postmaster General’s Collection, USPS, Smithsonian National Postal Museum, https://postalmuseum.si.edu/collections/object-spotlight/germany-us... (11) The Original 13, Settlers of Germantown, Pennsylvania. rootsweb, ancestry.com; The Original 13, Settlers of Germantown, Pennsylvania (12) The Founding of Germantown, Pastorius and the Founding of Germantown, http://www.wman.net/pastorius-and-the-founding-of-germantown (13) “Colonial and Revolutionary Families of Pennsylvania” John W. Jordan. Genealogical Publishing Com, 1978. ISBN 0-8063-0811-7, 9780806308111. p. 486 (14) Op den Graeff family, History, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Op_den_Graeff_family (15) Letter, Dorothea Schweiger (file); Krefeld Imm V 4 #1 pg 10; Op Den Graeff, v 1 LKS film 1036920 #3; Pennsylvania Folk Life V3 #8, paragraphs 4-7., http://genealogy.com (16) Op_den_Graeff_Krefeld_Stained-Glass_Windows_V, with swan and coat of arms, By unknown author - Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld Nancy Dellinger: The Legend of the Lohengrin Swan http://www.creativealternatives.net/geneal/opdengraff/, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47165579 sources for stained glass pictures shown in 'photos' (1) Op_den_Graeff_Krefeld_Stained-Glass_Windows _VII, marriage By Unknown - Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld Nancy Dellinger: The Legend of the Lohengrin Swan http://www.creativealternatives.net/geneal/opdengraff/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8017340 (2) Herman op den Graeff’s coat of arms at the stained window of Krefeld, Op_den_Graeff_Krefeld_Stained-Glass_Windows_I, with the coat of arms from Hermann op den Graeff, showing “Lohengrin Swan” of the Arms of Cleves, By Unknown - Kaiser-Wilhelm Museum, Krefeld Nancy Dellinger: The Legend of the Lohengrin Swan http://www.creativealternatives.net/geneal/opdengraff/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8017340

Links

• https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Historical_and_biographical_sketch...
• https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Graeff
• https://www.revolvy.com/page/John-William%2C-Duke-of-Jülich%252DCleves%252DBerg
• https://archive.org/stream/settlementofgerm01penn#page/149/mode/1up...

Sources

• Herman Op den Graeff In Passenger and Immigration Lists, 1500 - 1900 - https://www.geni.com/photo/view/6000000007283508432?album_type=photos_of_me&photo_id=6000000086206852839&position=0
• Bender, Harold S. "Graeff, op den (Opdegraf, Updegrave, Updegrove) family." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1957. Web. 15 October 2012. http://www.gameo.org/encyclopedia/contents/graeff_op_den_opdegraf_u....
• Op Den Graeff Ancestry- http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~villandra/OldGeoc...
• Our Family Ancestors - Thomas Maxwell Potts (1895)-https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-62766-83/our-family-ance
• The settlement of Germantown, Pennsylvania, and the beginning of German emigration to Germantown-https://archive.org/stream/settlementofgerm01penn#page/144/mode/1up

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GEDCOM Note

Category:Krefeld,_Nordrhein-Westfalen

Biography<ref name="Hull">William I. Hull, William Penn and the Dutch Quaker Migration to Pennsylvania: (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1970), p.210.</ref>

Isack Hermans Op den Graeff was born in Krefeld in 1616 to Herman Op den Graeff and Greitijen Pletjes. Hemarried Greitijen Peters and was converted along with his family to Quakerism. He died in 1679 leaving his widow, three sons, Derick, Herman, and Abrahamand one daughter, Margrit.
The family, including the widow set sail for Philadelphia on the "Concord" and arrived in October 1683. The widow died soon after arrival, but the children went on to help establish Germantown, Pennsylvania. Note: This wiki profile had the date of birth listed as 28 Feb 1616 and the date of death listed as 17 Jan 1679 when it was adopted by Donna Storz. There were no sources for the exact dates provided.