XIc. Pieter de Clercq Jacobsz (1748-1802) x Agatha Stockelaar
Son of Jacob de Clercq and Geertruyd Margaretha Verbrugge
Pieter de Clercq Jacobsz, born Amsterdam 21 March 1748, died Amsterdam 24, buried there (Noorderkerk) 29 June 1802, married Nieuwer Amstel 24 April 1770 Agatha Stockelaar, born there 17 March 1753, died Amsterdam 27 Dec. 1781, buried there (Oude Kerk) 2 Jan. 1782, dr. of Jan and Aletta van Rixtel.
In April 1770 Pieter de Clercq Jacobsz married Agatha Stockelaar, also from a Mennonite family. A few years later, as a result of an accident, Agatha turned blind. And already before her 28th birthday, she died. Pieter was left with six children, of which the youngest was only fourteen months old, but he never remarried.
Although Pieter was traditionally educated to become a merchant, like his ancestors, his career went into another direction, because of his marriage. Agatha was the youngest of three daughters of Jan Stockelaar (1713-1767), who owned a large cotton printing factory outside Amsterdam, called 'Het Torentje' (also: 'Buytendruck'). In fact, it was the largest of its kind in this part of the country. But since Jan had no sons, it was Pieter who took over the establishment. In the painting below the factory can be seen in the background.
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Pieter de Clercq Jacobzn and Agatha Stockelaar, painted by Balthasar Beschey, 1771
Taking over the business of his family-in-law was no fortunate choice; the once blooming cotton printing industry got into a crisis in the last part of the 18th century, because of competition abroad, leading to great financial losses. One factory after another had to close. And eventually, in 1792, also Pieter had no other option but to sell his factory.
Below are two engravings of the factory from circa 1727, when it was owned by Nicolaas van Ommeren. His widow sold the factory eight years later to Agatha's grandfather.
Two engravings, taken from: 'Spiegel van Amsterdams Zomervreugd', by Abraham Rademaker, ca. 1727.
Before the closing of the factory in 1792, there had been quite some entanglements, and not just economic, but also political. Pieters industry wasn't the only one in crisis; the whole economic situation in the once rich and powerful Dutch Republic was going from bad to worse. This led to political turmoil and a polarization between the Old Regime (the Nassau stadtholders and their adherents) and Patriots, who wanted economic and political reform. Eventually this opposition got a military dimension, when the patriots advocated the right of the people to defend themselves and organized burgher militias.
After an incident in 1787, in which the wife of the stadtholder William V was arrested by patriots, her brother the King of Prussia, decided to send an army to the Dutch Republic and set things straight. The Dutch Patriots were no match for the Prussian soldiers, who relatively easy marched towards Amsterdam and besieged this main city of the Republic. Soon the Amsterdam Patriots surrendered.
The De Clercqs were avid Patriots and so was Pieter. In fact, he was captain of the burgher militia in his area. And fate would have it, that in his district a battle was fought with the Prussian army. But again, the Patriots were no match.
Things got even worse, after that. The Prussian general, the Count of Brunswick, decided to make the factory and home of Pieter his headquarter, because of its strategic position outside Amsterdam, and stayed her for a few weeks. These uninvited guests will already have been unpleasant company. But when they left to return to Berlin, they looted the house from all its valuable goods! They even took a beautiful porcelain service that Pieter liked so much. His total damage was huge: more than 20.000 guilders.
As said before, Pieter sold the factory in 1792, after which it was demolished. However, he remained active in the cotton-printing industry, as the director and partial owner of another factory, nearby. This factory was financed by a group of mainly Mennonite stockholders, among which several friends and family members.
A few years later, however, Pieter moved back to the city and became more active in his Mennonite congregation, as deacon, regent of the home for the elderly women of the congregation and as curator of a college for the education of Mennonite preachers.
Also Pieter was an active member of some of the cultural/literary and political societies, that were blooming in Amsterdam at that time. Already in 1784, when still living outside the city walls, he had become member of the ‘Vaderlandsche Sociëteit’, an important patriotic society that was prohibited by the government in 1787. In 1786 he had joined the much smaller and more intimate literary society ‘Tot Leerzaam Vermaak’ ('For Instructive Amusement'), of which his nephews Pieter de Clercq jr. and Christiaan van Eeghen already were members then. These years he also joined the well-known society called ‘Nut van ‘t Algemeen’ (Society for the General Good). Finally, in 1788, he had become member of ‘Felix Meritis’, the most famous society of Amsterdam, that was accommodated in a large, distuinghesed building at the Keizersgracht. Felix Meritis ('Fortunate through Merit') had several departments: for commerce, physics, arts, literature and music. From 1795 to 1798 Pieter was director of the musical department.
He himself played the violin; the inventory of his furnishings, made after Pieters death, mentions a violin made in the Italian town of Cremona, traditionally the world capital of violin makers.
In the morning of 24 June 1802, at about nine o'clock, Pieter died in his house on the corner of the Leidsegracht and Keizersgracht, after a protracted weakening, at the age of 54.
Clipping from an Amsterdam newspaper
The fourth child of Pieter and Agatha was Hendrick de Clercq (1776-1850) who in 1794 left Amsterdam and settled in Cazenovia, NY