William Van Dyck

Born in 1756 in Somerset County, New Jersey, William Van Dyck grew up in the heartland of what had been New Netherland just a century before. His family name— sometimes spelled Van Dyck, sometimes Van Dyk, reflecting the fluidity of 18th-century orthography—connected him directly to the Dutch settlers who had established themselves along the Raritan River valley generations earlier.

Somerset County in the 1750s and 60s was a patchwork of Dutch and English farms, a landscape of rolling hills and fertile soil where families maintained the old ways even as English governance settled over the former Dutch colony. The Van Dyck family would have spoken Dutch at home, worshipped in the Dutch Reformed tradition, and maintained ties to the tight-knit community of Dutch-descended families in the region.

When revolution came to New Jersey in 1776, William was twenty years old—prime age for military service. The decision to join the Continental Army was not just a political choice but a deeply personal one. Somerset County sat in a strategic corridor between New York and Philadelphia, and the war would rage across these farms and villages for years. To fight was to defend home itself.

William served in the company commanded by Captain Abraham Vroom, a unit raised from Somerset County men. This wasn't an anonymous mass of soldiers—these were neighbors, relatives, men who had grown up together and would return together (if they returned at all) to the same farms and churches.

They fought not as strangers, but as neighbors defending the soil their families had worked for generations.

Captain Abraham Vroom himself was a prominent figure in Somerset County, and his company reflected the social structure of the community. The officers were local leaders; the enlisted men were their sons, nephews, and farmhands. This was citizen-soldier warfare in its truest form.

The company was part of the New Jersey militia system, which operated differently from the Continental Army regulars. Militia companies were called up for specific campaigns, served their terms, and returned home to plant or harvest. But when danger threatened New Jersey directly—as it did repeatedly—these men answered the call.

The Battle of Monmouth was the longest single-day battle of the Revolutionary War, and one of the hottest. On that suffocating June morning, British forces under General Henry Clinton were marching from Philadelphia back to New York, strung out in a miles-long column through the New Jersey countryside. General Washington saw an opportunity to strike.

William Van Dyck and the Somerset County men found themselves in the thick of it. The temperature climbed past 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Men in heavy wool uniforms, carrying muskets and equipment, collapsed from heat exhaustion. Some died from the heat alone, never struck by enemy fire. Water was scarce. The air was thick with humidity and smoke.

The battle raged for hours. Initial American attacks became confused, then Washington himself arrived to rally the troops. The fighting see-sawed across fields and through orchards. Artillery boomed. Musket volleys cracked in disciplined sequence. And through it all, the Continental Army—including William and his Somerset neighbors—held their ground.

By the end of the day, the British had retreated under cover of darkness, leaving the Americans in possession of the field. Tactically, the battle was inconclusive. But psychologically, it was transformative. The Continental Army had proven it could fight a major engagement against British regulars and not break. The ragtag force that had frozen at Valley Forge just months before had become a real army.

William Van Dyck had witnessed and participated in that transformation. He had stood in line under impossible heat, loaded and fired his musket, held his position when chaos erupted around him. He had done what his community, his family, and his new nation needed him to do.

William survived the war—no small feat given the casualties, disease, and hardships that claimed so many. He returned to Somerset County and resumed the life of a farmer and community member. The records are sparse, as they often are for ordinary citizens of the early republic, but we know he married and raised a family.

His children would grow up in the new United States of America, a nation he had helped create. They would inherit both the Dutch cultural legacy of New Netherland and the American identity forged in revolution. The Van Dyke name would continue through his descendants, carrying forward both streams of heritage.

William Van Dyck died in 1807, having lived just long enough to see the nation survive its first three decades. Jefferson was president. The Louisiana Purchase had doubled the country's size. The American experiment, still fragile, had proven it could endure.

He left no memoir. No letters survive in his own hand. But his service at Monmouth and his life in Somerset County tell a story that was repeated thousands of times across the new nation: ordinary people doing extraordinary things, building something new while honoring what came before.

William Van Dyck stands in the middle of our family's American story. Behind him stretch the generations who came from New Netherland, who spoke Dutch, who carved farms from the wilderness of what would become New Jersey. Ahead of him lie the descendants who would push westward with the expanding nation—to Ohio, Indiana, Iowa, and ultimately Oklahoma Territory.

His grandson, Benjamin Franklin Van Dyke, would become a lawyer and Oklahoma territorial warden, would join the Sons of the American Revolution on the strength of William's service, would live long enough to see automobiles and airplanes. That great-great-great grandson would stand on Oklahoma prairie and look back across the generations to a New Jersey battlefield where his ancestor had helped secure American independence.

In the 20th century, William's descendants would serve in two World Wars, build lives across America, and carry the story forward. Each generation added new chapters, but the thread runs back through William Van Dyck, standing in the smoke and heat at Monmouth, doing his part in the great American experiment.