Home About Travel History Genealogy Resources
Americana Journeys - Genealogy History
Count Egmont in Brussles and the Van Egmonts of Albany
In the center of Brussels, Belgium, there is a statue to a national hero which may have some special meaning to American families of Dutch colonial descent from the Schermerhorn line. You might think Dutch ancestors would take you to Holland and not Belgium, but in the distant past, the origins of Belgium are found are in the Dutch speaking “Low Countries” of Flanders, Hainaut and Holland. Count Lamoral Egmont (also spelled Egmond) was a descendant of one of the oldest families of the lowlands. His grandfather Jan (John) was the original Count Egmont, holding a castle in Noord Holland not far from Amsterdam. Lamoral was born in Hainaut, the second of three sons and when his older brother died, inherited the title, although his residence was in Flanders. Count Lamoral Egmont, who had become a military hero, married the daughter of the German Prince Elector of the Palatine, Frederick III. Egmont was Catholic at a time when the Reformation was sweeping through Europe (see Martin Luther Wittenberg). He first refused to join Prince William of Orange against the Spanish and the houses of Burgundy, but protested along with his cousin, the Count of Hoorn, against the Spanish church bringing the Inquisition to Flanders. Egmont and Hoorn were arrested by Spain’s Duke of Alva, held in the castle of Ghent (see Gravensteen Castle Ghent) until they were beheaded in Grand Place Square in Brussels on the June, 5, 1568. The anger of the common pepple to the unjust execution ultimately rose in a revolt which expelled the Spanish in the Eighty Years War, which established the protestant House of Orange.
The lands of of the Egmonts were confiscated after the execution and the family scattered. Then, about 40 years later, in the mid 1600s, a Van Egmont set sail for the newly discovered land of America with his son, settling on Castle Island, some marshy land in the Hudson River now part present day Albany, one of the first permanent settlements in the New World.
Like many connections of American families to European noble lines, considerable debate has been raised over the connection between the noble Count of Egmont and the Van Egmonts who settled in America. The noble Egmonts later regained some of their property and rights and traced a lineage, including the Count's cousin being married off to Henry III, the King of France. Another Egmont line is traced to Mary Stewart, Queen of Scots (see Westminster Abbey London). While the Van Egmont who settled in America may have only come from the confiscated estates of the Egmonts. The record is a little foggy. The ancient castle of the Egmonts in Holland was destroyed in 1573, five years after the Count's death, on order of William of Orange to keep it from falling to the Spanish, and those who lived on that land dispersed to nearby towns and farm lands. The nobleman in the statue may not be a blood relative after all, but the personal connection to history is well worth the journey.
Should you want to find the statue of a potential ancestor, or just a connected piece of history, the Zavel Square Park in Brussels is located just a few blocks from the Royal Palace and the Magritte Museum on the Rue de la Regence, where Count Egmont's residence once stood, with the statue atop a gushing water fountain in a lovely small park of landscaped flowers and hedges.