Cornelius Hendrickson - Navigator/Explorer

Cornelius Hendrickson was my 11th Great-Grandfather, ancestor of Phoebe Hendrickson, the grandmother of William A. Piatt Sr., who was the father of Nathaniel Piatt of Branch County, Michigan fame.

Below is his story.

Cornelius Hendrickson was born about 1572 in Utrecht, Holland. He became a Navigator and the first white man to set foot on the soil of Pennsylvania and West Jersey. He was the discoverer of the Raritan and Schuylkill rivers, and explored the Delaware to the falls at the present site of Trenton. During the latter part of 1614 he explored the coast of New Jersey in the yacht "Onrust", Dutch for Restless, the first vessel built in New Amsterdam or in America. This vessel was first sailed by Captain Adraien Block. Full accounts can be found in O'Callaghan's & Brodhead's Histories as well as in the records of the NY Historical Society.

Papers of the Historical Society of Delaware, by Historical Society of Delaware; Published by the Society 1903...

There were a succession of voyages from Holland to the new world. In the fleet the ship Fortune, commanded by captain Cornelius Jacobson Mey, from whom Cape May derived it's name. In the same fleet was Adrien Block's Tijger (Tiger) vessel, which was destroyed by fire when about to sail for home. The rest of the vessels continued without it. Captain Block built a hut on the shore of a little island where he spent the winter of 1613/14 in Constructing a boat to take the place of the burnt Tiger.

This new craft was the first built in America, was 38 feet keel, 44 1/2 feet long, 11 feet wide and 16 tonnage. She was christened Onrust or Restless, and although scarcely larger than a modern fishing smack or oyster shallop, was distined to great historical fame; for it was with this diminutive vessel that captain Cornelius Hendrickson in 1615-1616 made a thorough exploration of Delaware Bay and river, at least as far north as the mouth of the Schuylkill. In the course of hisadventures the enterprising explorer ascended our Christiana, where he met a band of Minqua Indians with whom he traded; and it should prove a matter of some interest to our immediate community that perhaps on the very spot where Wilmington now stands the captain held a friendly conference with the red men, from whom moreover he rescued three white captives who had wandered from the Dutch fort on the Hudson.

Hendricksen's own report distinctly states that he "discovered and explored certain lands, a bay and three rivers situated between 38 and 40 degrees' Hendricksen, as the first explored in detail of the Delaware Bay and River, was the first white man to tread the soil of what is now Delaware territory. He accurately reported the character of the country, it's trees, streams, native fruits, wild animals, abundant game and temperate climate.

He was the first to sail to present day Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Encyclopedia of New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 2004

Captain Cornelius Hendrickson, a Dutch explorer and cartographer, sailed into Barnegat Bay and up the Toms River. He charted these bodies of waters and filed the first definitive map of the coast line of New Jersey in Amsterdam in 1616.

http://www.theonrust.com/

The Onrust was launched into Upper New York Bay in April 1614. It explored the New York coastal areas and rivers, sailed through the treacherous passage called Helle-gat (Hell Gate) in the East River, explored the harbors of Long Island and Connecticut discovering the Housatonic and Thames rivers, and sailed up the Connecticut (deVersche River) River past the site of Hartford. The Onrust continued on to Narragansett and Buzzards Bays, and Cape Cod. (Block apparently first sailed the Onrust, and Hendrickson soon after).