Descendants of the DeVoor/ DeVaux Family
of County Artois, Spanish Netherlands

DeVoor/Devore

Generation #1

Nicholas DeVeaux of  County of Artois, Spanish Netherlands

Research Note: A preponderance of information on the early DeVeaux family was gleaned from the "Genealogy of the DeVeaux Family" by Thos. F. DeVoe dtd 1885 and the "Revised History of Harlem" by James Riker dtd 1904.

The following is a compilation of information which links the early DeVeaux/ DeVaux/ DuFour/ DeVoe/ DeVoor immigrants to what was New Amsterdam, Dutch America, and is now Manhattan, New York, with the Nicholas DeVaux family who immigrated c. 1674 to Manhattan NY and are the progenitors of Daniel DeVoor b. c. 1660 County Artois, Spanish Netherlands.

The DeVoor/ DeVeaux family of d' Artois, France

Probably born in Picardy on Walloon soil. Also De Vaux, Devoe, Devoir spellings. Daniel is recorded as Daniel Vooren in the Tappan, Rockland CO. NY records. Daniel & brothers Frederick, Nicholas and Jacob, with their parents--Daniel DeVoor/DeVeaux was a son of Nicholas DeVeaux and Susanne Francois--left Annis (Anicy?), France, to escape persecution as Huguenots. Went to Mannheim, Germany, with king's murderous troopers at their heels. Almost captured. When Mannheim was invaded by Louis XIV, Daniel & Nicholas escaped to England. They came to NY with Sir Edmund Andros, when he became 2nd Governor of NY. Parents stayed in Germany and were killed. Jacob & Frederick came to New Harlem in 1675.

     Excerpted from "Devore Family 1500-1992, Betty Mann," <http://www.longislandsurnames.com/> 14 December 2014.

This Nicholas is listed as the father of the DeVeaux families who fled Europe due to continuous warfare, desolation, and religious persecution, immigrating to America from France, the Spanish Netherlands, the Dutch Republic, the Palatinate of the Rhine, and England during the period of 1653 to 1674.

Our timeframe, 1556 to 1656, was one of continual religious wars between the predominant Catholic states and the newly Reformed and Lutheran states of Europe and continual state wars within the ranks of Catholic Europe. As a French Huguenot, life was perilous. [French Huguenots in the Spanish Netherlands]

The breaking out of war between France and Spain in 1635 caused a considerable influx of Protestant refugees into England, from Picardy, Artois, Hainault and Flanders. Involving these provinces in all the perils and disasters of a pitiless border warfare, and lasting nearly the fourth of a century, it resulted in the conquest of Artois, and parts of Flanders and Hainault, and their annexation to France. . . 

While many left Picardy, the French advance and successes in Hainault and Artois were causing a larger migration of the Protestant Walloons; and among these also a number whose destiny led them to Harlem. We can make but brief allusion to such events, military or otherwise, in their respective localities, as seemingly influenced their removal. . . 

From Mons, the rich capital of [Hainault], seated to the north of Avesnes, and within the coal region called the Borinage, came David du Four, of the same name, and not improbably the same blood, as the martyr of Le Cateau, but whose posterity, which became numerous in his country, changed the form of their name to Devoor and Devoe.

    Riker, James, "Revised History of Harlem, 1904," p. 63-65.

So by 1656, Spain had renewed the Eighty-Years War with the Dutch Republic; Manheim and the Lower Palatinate had been sacked; the French Army invaded the Spanish Netherlands, doing to County Artois what the Spanish Army did to the Palatinate of the Rhine; and our brother Huguenots in France were being slaughtered. If watching your friends and neighbors fight a religious war while worrying for your family's safety wasn't enough to run you off, invasion and desolation by the French Army was. This is the point where our ethnic French Huguenot families began their flight to freedom.

In fear for their lives, the purported children of Nicholas fled to Sedan, France, and the towns of the Palatinate of the Rhine, and the Dutch Republic, and even England, eventually finding refuge in America. Those were the children. Nothing more is know about this Nicholas DeVeaux.

Research Note: In order to be successful during their flight to safety, eventually settling in America, these family members would have had to be able to read, write, and speak French then German then Dutch and then English.

    Children

Research Note: The following is a list of DeVeaux immigrants to New Amsterdam/ New York but not necessarily a list of Nicholas' children.

    1. Nicholas DeVaux b. c. 1620 County of Artois, Spanish Netherlands

    2. Matheus DeVos

Dutch Reformed Church of New Amsterdam, Dutch America:
1656 05 Nov; Mattheus de Vos, wid Anna Peters;
Maria Pollet, wid Philip Gerar.

    3. Henry DeVos (brother of Anna DeVos)

Dutch Reformed Church, Manhattan, New Amsterdam; 9/24/1659
Parents Child Sponsors
Hans de Vos
Geertje Seltens		 Mary  

    4. David DuFour

Dutch Reformed Church, Manhattan, New Amsterdam; 7/7/1658
Parents Child Sponsors
David de Four Jannetje Frans Joris Joris
Hester Vincent
NEW YORK CALENDAR OF WILLS, p. 97:
Septbr. 14, 1671. David Du Four, from Bergen [now Mons, Belgium], and his wife Jannetje Frans from Guevrerin near Valeneyn [Belgium], living at Deudelbay [Turtle Bay, Manhattan] N.Y.
The survivor [surviving spouse], the sons David, Peter, and Claudeans; a son Jan by the first wife Maria Boulyn. Real and personal property. The survivor [surviving spouse] to be executor.
Endorsed by Johannes Kipp, one of the witnesses, in May 1699.

    5. Anna DeVos (sister of Henry DeVos)

Dutch Reformed Church of New Amsterdam, Dutch America::
1665 11 Apr; Christiaen Luyerszen, jm van Ley, in't Stift van Bremin;
Anna de Vos, jd van Amsterdam.

Generation #2

Caveat
This site is provided for reference only. Except where specifically cited, information contained is conjecture and should not be considered as fact.
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