Theunis Davidse Blauvelt

see Leiby's The Revolutionary War in the Hackinsack Valley p. 179-180
• spied surreptiously on his neighbors and evacuated to Canada after the war where he married the daughter of another staunch American loyalist born in the Hackensack Valley.

•THEUNIS BLAUVELT (David Blauvelt-3, Johannes Gerretse Blauvelt-2, Gerrit Hendricksen Blauvelt-1) was born 2 Feb. 1747, and baptised at Tappan 22 Feb. 1747. His first wife, by whom he had three children, was Catharine DeBaun. She was the daughter of Jan DeBaun and Cathlyntje Haring, and was born 30 Jul. 1754, and baptised at Clarkstown on 11 Aug. 1754, #284. We do not know when she died, but we do know that she is mentioned as the wife of Theunis Blauvelt in her father's will, dated 11 Dec. 1783. It was probated 1 Mar. 1790, and in the division of the estate on 15 Apr. 1791, she is referred to as deceased, and the late wife of Theunis D. Blauvelt. On the same date Jacobus Blauvelt, brother of Theunis, was appointed as guardian of her three children: Maria, Catharina and Jan. That would place her death between December 1783 and April 1791. As a further help, we know that the first child of Theunis by his second wife was born in 1790. Robert Brooks Blauveldt, of Yarmouth,! Nova Scotia, has advised us that Theunis married Hannah Van Norden about 1788. Hannah Van Norden was the daughter of Gabriel Van Norden and Jane Westervelt; and Robert says that she was born about 1770. At the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, Theunis was residing with his mother and step-father in Bergen County, NJ; but when, late in 1776, the British occupied New York, Theunis allied himself with them serving as a scout and a spy. Later he was commissioned a lieutenant in the King's Militia Volunteers by Sir Henry Clinton. Afterward, he was promoted to captaincy in Maj. Philip Van Cortlandt's Third New Jersey Volunteers, and he seems also to have been connected with the Queen's Rangers. When the war ended, with other Loyalists, he went to Nova Scotia, and, with others, founded the town of Shelborn. In 1785, he moved to Tusket, which place seems to have at first been called New Nyack. In 1786 he filed a claim with the Loyalist Claims Commission for compensation for the confiscation of lands that he has owned in Bergen County. This land had belonged to his deceased father, David Blauvelt, and had been deeded to him by his step-father, Jan Flierboom, in 1772. It would appear that his claim was allowed and that his compensation was his share of the lands at Tusket, that were granted to Philip Van Cortlandt and thirty-nine others, of whom Theunis was one, in 1788. Here he conducted an inn. The house which he built is still standing and is owned by Robert Brooks Blauveldt. Theunis died in 1830 and is buried in the village cemetery. ~• from: rootsweb