My ancestor Johanes Weesner

It’s been fascinating to me to uncover nuggets of my family’s history in the 1918 book The Wisners in America — but it may not be of much interest to anyone else whose name isn’t Wisner. My apologies to the non-Wisners out there.

The book begins with the arrival of the first Wisner:

Johanes Weesner, of Switzerland, was the progenitor of most of the Wisners now living in this country. He came to America about 1714 (the exact date has not been established nor is it of much importance), with 10,000 troops of Queen Anne’s Swiss contingent, who had fought against Louis XIV, of France, under the Prince of Orange, and later under the Duke of Marlborough....

Perhaps the most reliable information we have about Johanes Weesner is contained in “A Memorial to Henry Wisner,” published by Franklin Burdge, of New York, in September, 1872.... It will be noted that Burdge says:

“Johanes Weesner was born in Switzerland and fought against Louis XIV, of France, in the allied army under the Prince of Orange, and afterwards under the Duke of Marlborough. When their warlike toils were done, Queen Anne undertook to provide some of the foreign troops a home in the colony of New York.

“The emigrants encamped for some months on Governor’s Island. Then Johanes Weesner went to work on the farm of Christian Snedicor, of Hampstead, Long Island. Snedicor owned land on the Wawayanda Patent, in Orange county, and he sent Weesner there to bring part of it under cultivation. By paying 30 pounds Weesner became the owner of a farm on July 23, 1714. It is supposed the situation is the present town of Warwick, near Mount Eve, on the border of the Drowned Lands. The district was called Florida as early as 1733. Johanes Weesner died a little before May, 1744.”

The book goes on:

That Johanes Weesner was a thrifty and industrious man, and with the hearty co-operation of his family, accumulated considerable property for those days, thus displaying shrewd intelligence and fine judgment is indicated clearly in his will…

It reads:

“In the name of God, Amen, I, Johanes Weesner, of Florida, in Goshen, in Orange county, yeoman, this July 6, 1733, I leave to my eldest son, Hendrick, 30 pounds. I leave to my son, Adam, my dwelling house and land I now live upon, with all the buildings; and he is to pay to my son Hendrick the 30 pounds above mentioned. I leave to my youngest daughter, Mary, now living with me, 140 acres of land, which I purchased of Barent Bloome, June 7, 1732, situated in Orange county, near Goshen, as by deed.

“After payment of debts, I leave to my three daughters, Catharine, wife of Thomas Blain, Ann, wife of Philip King, and Mary, all the rest of my personal estate.

“If my dear and loving wife, Elizabeth, should survive me, she is to have the use of all my estate, and no division is to be made during her life. I make my wife Elizabeth, and my good and trusty friends, Michael Dunning and Daniel Denton, both of Goshen, executors.

“Witnesses, John Smith, Joseph Sutherland, Josiah Keeder. Proved in New York, May 19, 1744.”

Hendrick’s son Henry Wisner, the grandson of Johanes Weesner, later became a member of the First and Second Continental Congresses, and the only New Yorker to vote for the Declaration of Independence.

Back to Governors Island

I see Governors Island nearly every morning when I walk over the Brooklyn Bridge on the way to work, though it was a while before I even knew what it was.

The island intrigued me for a long time, especially when it was barred to the public: a low wooded island with a few buildings scattered on it, and a massive octagonal white structure with vertical black bars on its sides. The white octagon was so somber and impressive that I thought it must be a monument of some kind. (I only learned later that it provides ventilation for one of the tunnels under the East River.) During the winter, when I walked home over the bridge after dark, it was eerie to see only one or two electric lights on the island. The island was an oasis of quiet and darkness, only a few hundred yards from the glowing glass towers of the financial district.

Once the island was opened to the public (though only during the summer, and for limited hours), I tried to get there once or twice a year on the ferry. My favorite spots were the round fort at the island’s corner, with its walls of soft red brick and deep embrasures, the broad sloping meadow that spreads out from the second, star-shaped fort, and the long row of deserted frame houses where officers used to live. Cicadas shrilled in the hot grass, and Canada geese stalked along the footpaths.

Governors Island is one of the most peaceful spots I know in the city. I feel a sense of connection there, so it was a little strange to read in The Wisners in America that Governors Island was the first place in the New World where my ancestor Johanes Weesner lived. He and about 10,000 other Swiss soldiers arrived in New York around 1714 were “camped” on Governors Island for several months before finding new homes.

Wisner Park in Elmira, New York

This postcard, a copy of which I own, shows Wisner Park in the small upstate city of Elmira, New York — not far from Skaneateles in the Finger Lakes region, where I grew up.

The settlement of Wisnerburg merged with Newtown in 1792, and Newtown was officially renamed Elmira in 1808. (In Orange County, where my family has had roots since the 1700s, there’s a town called Wisner, a little bit west of Bear Mountain State Park. I’ve been to the park but didn’t know about the town.)

I dimly remember childhood visits to Elmira, which seemed nice enough. Mark Twain married his wife there in 1870, and is buried there. But there are sinister notes in Elmira’s history. A book called Death Camp of the North describes the Civil War prison camp there, where according to Wikipedia, “a combination of malnutrition, prolonged exposure to brutal winter weather, and disease directly attributable to the dismal sanitary conditions on Foster’s Pond and lack of medical care.”

A maximum-security prison, the Elmira Correctional Facility was established in 1876. Although it was billed as the first “reformatory,” the policies of indeterminate sentences and corporal punishment used by warden Zebulon Brockway resulted in prisoners ending up in mental hospitals.

Family history

For many years I’ve been aware that I’m descended from a Swiss soldier (or “mercenary,” as family tradition has it) who arrived in the American colonies before the revolution.

I knew, too, that I had an ancestor named Henry Wisner who was a member of the First and Second Continental Congresses, and who missed signing the Declaration of Independence for reasons not entirely clear. On a trip to Washington when I was in high school, I went into the lobby of the National Archives and was thrilled to look inside a glass case and see his signature on a document called the Articles of Association.

My father recently gave me a book called The Wisners in America: A Family of Patriots and Pioneers, by G. Franklin Wisner. Published in 1918, it has a heavy green binding, softened with age, and an ornamentally embossed title in faded gilt. There are many fold-out pages of genealogical charts in the back, on smooth brittle paper that has to be handled carefully. One of them traces the line from Johannes Weesner (the original Swiss soldier) to my paternal grandfather.

I had seen the book many times but had never felt the impulse to delve into it. I hadn’t gotten much farther than the Wisner coat of arms, which also appears at wisner.com, the website of a manufacturer of antique-looking view cameras. The motto is Amore nonvi, which my father used to say meant “Nobody loves Violet.” (It’s just possible that this is incorrect.)