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Taken from the Jannetje Vroom Bible in the museum of Old St. Edward's Church
Joris was probably born near Raritan, New Jersey. He was also known by the English form of George Vroom. His father's homestead hasn't been located, but his grandfather settled in that area and Joris had siblings baptized at the Raritan (now First Somerville) Dutch Reformed Church before the Frelinghuysen controversy. When father Hendrick Vroom died he willed the plantations on which his sons lived to them in their own right. Joris home was in the vicinity of Raritan Landing in the township of Piscataway. He was a manager for a land lottery at Raritan Landing in 1748/1749, and held a real estate auction at his house on 6 April 1750.(1) In a record of earmarks for livestock, that of Joris, for "cattle, horses, sheep & swine" was a "crop of the top of the left ear & a half-penny in the upper side of the right ear." It was entered in February of 1752.(2) Joris died at 42, but no cause has been found. He didn't leave a will. Letters of Administration were given to his brothers, his second wife Sara having renounced her claims on the estate. An inventory of his estate was taken on 2 March 1757, which included a "Dutch folio Bible" and sermon book.(3)
Sara and the children moved to New York State. A thumbnail biography on her stepson Pieter Dumont Vroom, a Revolutionary War colonel and politician, says "in his early life he lived in the city of New York" before returning to New Jersey.(4) Sara may have taken the boys and their half-sister Jannetje to live with her relatives in Flatbush or Jamaica between 1756 and 1761, when she remarried. Sarah was a widow and a mother of three from Flatbush when she married Joris, so had no ties to New Jersey after he died. Given that the boys barely had a connection with Sara, their stepmother for only several years, they may have been placed with a guardian who lived in Manhattan. They may not have known their sister beyond infancy. In any case, they returned to and settled in New Jersey and eventually joined the revolutionary cause, further suggesting that they had little or no contact with Sara and Jannetje, whose intimate connection with the Ditmars family brought them into the sphere of Loyalism.
children of Joris/George and Gerritje (Dumond) Vroom:
i. Hendrick
ii. Pieter/Peter Dumont, b. b. 27 January 1745
child of Joris/George and Sarah (Remsen) Voorhees Vroom:
iii. Jannetje/Jane, b. 1 October 1755
His birth and death dates come from his daughter's Bible in the Old St. Edward's Church museum, Clementsport. His first marriage is recorded on their marriage license, transcribed in Somerset Historical Society Quarterly, vol. , p. 80. The Reformed Dutch Church of New York has the record of his second marriage, "persons with license," "George Vroom & Sarah Voorhees, wed." meaning widow. They were engaged on 2 September and married the next day.
1. Genealogical Magazine of New Jersey
2. Ibid, vol. 26.
3. New Jersey Archives, vol. 32, p. 343
4. Somerset Historical Society Quarterly, vol. 5, p. 254.
all text and photographs © 1998-2005 by Doug Sinclair unless where otherwise noted