Captain Adriaen Crijnen Post and The Peach Tree War

 

Captain Adriaen Crijnen Post (c. 1620–1677) was a prominent 17th-century Dutch colonial military officer, representative, and early settler. He played an important role in both Dutch Brazil and the New Netherland colony.

Adriaen Crijnen Post was born around 1620 in the Dutch Republic, possibly baptized in Tilburg on 17 May 1620. By the 1640s he was serving the West India Company in its Brazilian colony at Recife, where he married Claartje (Clara) Moockers. Their first known child, daughter Maria, was baptized there on 6 June 1649.

When the Portuguese reconquered Dutch Brazil in 1654, the family returned to the Netherlands and soon after sailed for New Netherland aboard the New Netherland’s Fortune, arriving in December 1650. 

By 1655 Adriaen had become the on-site superintendent for Baron Hendrick van der Capellen’s one-third share of Staten Island. He led a small farming colony of about twenty settlers that quickly began to thrive.

The Peach Tree War 

In September 1655 the Peach Tree War erupted after a Dutch colonist shot a Native woman stealing peaches in Manhattan. Hackensack warriors retaliated, burning the Staten Island settlement on 15 September. Twenty-three settlers were killed; sixty-seven (including Adriaen, Clara, their five children, and two servants) were taken captive. Adriaen was released to negotiate; he shuttled repeatedly between Manhattan and the Hackensack camp at Paulus Hook, ultimately securing the release of fifty-six prisoners in exchange for guns, powder, blankets, and wampum.

The survivors returned to a ruined island. Adriaen gathered what cattle remained, camped among the ashes with soldiers, and tried to rebuild. Illness forced him to step down in 1656; Clara petitioned Stuyvesant for continued military protection, but the governor ordered the tiny group to relocate. Adriaen recovered, and between 1657 and 1663 three more children were baptized in New Amsterdam: Margarita (1657), Francoys (1659), and Geertruyd (1663). He remained active in court—often defending or being sued over debts tied to van der Capellen’s estate—and eventually moved the family to the mainland, settling in the area that became Bergen (now Jersey City), New Jersey.

Adriaen took the oath of allegiance in 1665 as an ensign in the Bergen Burgher Guard. In 1666 Governor Carteret used him as interpreter with sachem Oraton. He served on a 1671 Admiralty jury, represented Bergen in the 1673 New Jersey Assembly, and rose to lieutenant in the Bergen militia in 1675. He was one of the original 1683 patentees of the Acquackanonk Tract (though he did not live to see it formalized).

Adriaen Crijnen Post died in February 1677 and was buried in the village of Bergen. His widow Clara survived him. Their descendants spread across New Jersey and New York, carrying the Post name (and through daughter Machteld, the Quackenbosch–Winegard line) into the colonial era.

Genealogy notes for Adriaen Crijnen Post

Capt. Adriaen Crijnen Post — immigrant

Birth Abt. 1620 • Den Hague, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands

Death 18 Feb 1677 • Bergen, Sussex, New Jersey, USA

9th great-grandfather

Parents:

Pieter Post 1588–1637

Anna Michiel Jan Meijnaerts 1600–1632

Spouse:

Claretje Clara Mockers Lesueur 1632–1675, d/o Francois LeSueur immigrant 1590–1640 and Thomasse Bruer 1590–1628

Child:

Machteld Jans Post 1653–1700 (8th great-grandmother) m. Johannes Quackenbush (Quackenbosch) 1642-1720

Key children (with sources)

1. Maria Post (bapt. 6 Jun 1649, Recife) – married Jan Arentsen Bradt; our 8th great-grandmother in the essay’s line.
2. Machteld Jans Post (b. ~1650–1653) – our direct ancestor; married Johannes Quackenbosch; lived Albany area.
3. Margarita Post (bapt. 6 Jun 1657, New Amsterdam) – married into the de Hooges family.
4. Francoys Post (bapt. 17 Mar 1659) – later records sparse.
5. Adrian Post (no baptism found; d. bef. 1689, Bergen) – continued the male line in New Jersey.
6. Geertruyd Post (bapt. 21 Aug 1663) – married into local families.
7. Lysbeth Post (b. ~1668) – later records exist.

The family’s story is one of resilience: from Brazil to a frontier island raid, through capture and rebuilding, to civic leadership in early New Jersey. Our line through Machteld connects us directly to that turbulent founding chapter of New Netherland.

Thank you to Grok xAI for research help and narrative enhancement. — Drifting Cowboy