In April we were in The Netherlands for a river cruise tour of the tulip fields and gardens. It was a lovely time of the year to see this country, and we enjoyed seeing so many small towns and villages along the waterways. I was excited to see that we cruised by the town of Dordrecht twice on our itinerary, because that is where my Hoogerzeil ancestors lived. I had visited Dordrecht once before in 2017, when one of my distant Hogerzeil cousins gave me a tour of Dordrecht, Nieuwport, and Krimpen aan de Lek where our ancestors lived.
At one time, in the 1970s and 1980s (before the internet was used for genealogy research, and well before Google existed) I was stumped in trying to find out more information about my ancestor Peter Hoogerzeil. He came from Holland in the 1820s, and he was a mariner. He wrote many letters back and forth, and stated that he was from Dort in Holland. I was unable to find any town in The Netherlands with this name. Years later, on an online genealogy forum, a Dutch citizen told me that Dort was the nickname for Dordrecht. This helped break down a big brick wall for me, and suddenly I found generations of records on the Hoogerzeil family.
Dordrecht is on an island between many rivers in South Holland. It is considered the oldest city in The Netherlands, and is near Rotterdam, another major seaport. My Hoogerzeil ancestors were all commanders of whaling ships that sailed from Rotterdam to Greenland. It was easier for ships to reach the sea from Dordrecht before 1829 when the Voorne Canal was dug. By the end of the 1800s Rotterdam had become the major seaport, and Dordrecht lost many of its shipping and ship building industries. I wonder if this is why my 3rd great grandfather, Peter Hoogerzeil (1803 - 1889) stowed away on a ship full of hemp in the 1820s and landed in Salem, Massachusetts.
Many of the Hoogerzeil family church records (baptisms, marriages, funerals) were found at the "Grote Kerk" ("Big Church") which was built between 1285 and 1470. You can see this church tower from quite a distance, and while we cruised by I just had to look for this familiar square tower to know we were at Dordrecht. Below you can see photos we took of this church from the land in 2017, and above you can see the photos we took from the river boat.
Vincent used his iPhone to track our boat position and to find Dordrecht. When we were close I ran up to the top deck of the boat to take photos with my phone. Some people were eating lunch near the railing, and a kind woman passenger snapped the photo of me with the Grote Kerk. I'm so glad she offered to take that picture!
Click on the links below to see more blog posts about the town of Dordrecht, including my uncle's visit to his Hogerzeil cousins in Dordrecht after World War II.
2017
Hans Hogerzeil, Erik Kon, and Yours Truly
in front of the doors of the Grote Kerk, Dordrecht
Grote Kerk
View of Dordrecht by Aelbert Cuyp, 1655
By Aelbert Cuyp - English Heritage, Kenwood House, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57844274
For the truly curious:
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To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "An Ancestral City, Dordrecht, The Netherlands", Nutfield Genealogy, posted July 2, 2025, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2025/07/an-ancestral-city-dordrecht-netherlands.html: accessed [access date]).
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