Eleanor, Theodore, Franklin: they all had Dutch blood coursing through their veins, be it quite diluted by then. However, it remains a mystery where exactly their ancestors came from?This controversy has been addressed during Franklin?s and Theodore?s running for office, and needs to be addressed again during the years when Franklin?s Four Freedom Awards return ?home? to Middelburg. Rumour has it that the Roosevelts are unrelated to Zeeland. So does Zeeland have any right to host the Four Freedom Awards?
The Four Freedom Awards are organized for the first time in 1982. It is the year of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the 200th anniversary of the diplomatic relations between the Netherlands and the United States. The Franklin Delano Roosevelt Four Freedoms Foundation decides to schedule the awards ceremony in two locations. As Zeeland is the acclaimed province of origin of the Roosevelts, its capital Middelburg has been granted the honour of being one of these locations. During even years the ceremony will be held in Middelburg, whereas in uneven years the event takes place in Hyde Park, New York, which is the birthplace of Franklin.
But what if Zeeland is not the genealogical cradle of the Roosevelts?
And if not, should we continue to adhere to such an idyllic lie?
Claes Martenszen van Rosevelt emigrated from the Netherlands to New York City (which was then still Nieuw Amsterdam) somewhere between 1639 and 1648. He is the forbearer of the American Roosevelt family line, including Franklin, Eleanor and Theodore. However, it remains unclear to this day from which part in the Netherlands he originated. No relation to any Dutch family can be proven, and the American relics offer little guidance. At this point we are left with two plausible locations: Oud-Vossemeer and Haarlem.
1) Oud-Vossemeer is a small village on the Zeeuwse island Tholen. In the year 1901, the same year that Theodore becomes the 26th President of the United States, J. van der Minne publishes the family tree of the Roosevelts in the journal De Nederlandsche Leeuw, assuming that the name R(o)osevelt stems from a polder Northwest of the municipality of Tholen. Indeed records are found of a Van Rosevelt family living there, but there are records only from after 1640. Comparing the family crests of this family with the American family line gives few clues to the truth as the crests are completely different, save for the roses.
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Left: The family crest of the Zeeuwse Van Rosevelts
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Right: The family crest belonging to the American Roosevelts
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2) Haarlem, the location suggested by Franklin Delano Roosevelt himself. Researchers had earlier considered this possibility and had searched the province for resemblances in name, but they found no one except for a mayor called Theodoor van Roosevelt living in Amsterdam around 1670. They could not establish a relation between him and Claes Martenszen.
In 1939, journalist Virginia Pearce Delgado visits President Franklin to present him with the above Zeeuwse family crest and a family bible she had found. Upon arrival, Franklin makes clear that he considers his Zeeuwse origins a hoax and that his ancestors were from Haarlem, North Holland:
?I don?t believe a word about this Zeeland business. I think it?s all a grand publicity stunt someone thought up to attract tourists off the beaten tract. There?s a tradition in our family that the Roosevelts came from somewhere near Haarlem.? (PPF 73, Franklin Roosevelt Library)
Franklin himself, who had always had a great interest in genealogy, considered the Jewish family Rossacampo his ancestors. They had fled Spain in 1620 and settled in Haarlem, changing their name to Rosenvelt and eventually Roosevelt. However, their relation to Claes Martenszen van Rosevelt remains unproven up until this day.
3) A final option is that Claes Martenszen adopted a new name upon travelling to America. It is possible that Claes Martenszen adopted the name of his landlords, as was common for peasants in those days. This option would rule in favour of Tholen compared to Haarlem, as the Zeeuwse Van Rosevelts were landowners. This however entails that the actual lineage of the Roosevelts may be rather that of a peasant from Tholen, rather than nobility from Tholen.
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Seeing how difficult it is to prove the Zeeuwse lineage of the Roosevelts, is it just to organize the Four Freedom Awards in Middelburg? Should it not be held in Oud-Vossemeer (Tholen), since that is the ?real? location of origin, if we presume the Zeeuwse lineage? Or should we rather host it in Haarlem, as the creator of the Four Freedoms considered is his genealogical home? Or do we forfeit our right to this ceremony and should it be held in New York every year?
Vote here in this poll!
[Written by Esther van Luit; editted by Kelly Meulenberg & Sylvia Mannaerts]
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