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| Church Windowpane |
Morkel
A Remarkable South African Family
by André Theron Morkel
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Philip Morkel on perilous voyages to the far east in 17th century
establishing a farm that would be in the family for 300 years;
hosting 80 shipwrecked sailors;
the church window panes of 1723;
founding a town, Somerset West and a church;
food for hungry convicts on the Neptune,
breaking the pledge and being ostracised in the community;
sport internationals in rugby and cricket;
saving Brockman from the lion;
being licked in the face by a lion;
the Blantyre fighting Chamber of Commerce;
fighting on both sides in the Anglo Boer War;
pioneering in Rhodesia;
fighting Mugabe’s terrorists;
saving Rhinos and elephant from poachers;
linking mixed race Morkels with the family genealogy
founding a new church;
and much more.
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| Morne Morkel De Bos Farmyard and Dovecore |
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| Hendrik Johannes Morkel Charles André Morkel Catharina Morkel’s (neé Pasman) Kis at Die Bos 1798 - 1859 * 30 Mar 2015 17th Century |
Morkel Family
Chapter 1. From Germany to the CapeStamvader a1 Philip Morkel arrived at the Cape on the VOC returnship Oosterstein in 1708. He was a constapel, in charge of the gunpowder and guns on board, and was listed as born in Hamburg . We know quite a bit about his life at the Cape but his youth and family in Germany remain a mystery, as well as why he joined the VOC for perilous voyages to the East and settled at the Cape, which at that time was a fledgling company–dominated settlement in wild Africa.
VOC Archives
Apart from employment information (dates of voyages, pay rates etc), the VOC records in the Nationaal Archief in The Hague listed Philip Morkel as born in Hamburg but little else. The archives also contained a copy of Philip’s will made in 1734 while he was in ill health (enigszins ziekelijk), shortly before his death in 1735. In the will it is stated that he was born in Hamburg. But again there is no birth date or any other useful information about his origins in Germany. Philip also had an unmarried brother, Willem Morkel who was a surgeon (chirurgijn, or opperbarbier) on the VOC ships Mijnden, Arion and Groenswaart and who later stayed at Onverwacht, Philip’s farm in the Hottentots Holland. Willem was also listed as born in Hamburg. In one entry he is recorded as being Willem Philipsz Morkel. The ‘sz’ in the middle name is significant because it indicates that he was the son of Philip Morkel, thus revealing their father’s name. The use of ‘sz’ is a Dutch practice, not German, therefore, it was not handed down from earlier German ancestors. Thus, while we retain a question mark, it is very likely that their father was indeed Philip.
Philip’s Birth Date Mystery
THE MORKEL Genealogies were compiled from South African sources and not surprisingly, did not list a birth date for Philip, who was born in Germany. South African Genealogies of GISA list his birth date as 27 February 1677. With no source provided, the origin of this date remains a tantalising puzzle — efforts to locate the source were unsuccessful.
Hamburg Archives
THE GENEALOGICAL Society of Hamburg could not help, except to produce a 30 year old letter from author P. W. Morkel making the same inquiry. From a list of researchers that they provided, I contracted retired archivist Herr Johannes Vogel to search the Hamburg archives for Philip, Willem and their parents during the period around 1670 to 1690. His search included:
1. The archives of the five Evangelical/Lutheran churches in Hamburg at the time.
2. Citizen Records (Freeman’s oath books) from 1529 to 1732.
3. Marriage records for the City.
4. Death records for the City.
5. Hamburg Government records (Senat Protokollen).
His search was unfortunately negative. He could not find a single Morkel name in the archives — the first Morkel name in Hamburg appeared in the 1800s.
Morkel Families in Germany
Using directories, we found approximately 40 Morkels in Germany. We visited Professor Arnd Morkel, Rector of the University of Trier, and he showed us his family tree going back to Anthonius Morckel from Kirchgöns in 1633. Plotting Morkel names in the White Pages of the German Telekom, we found two “hot spots” – around Butzbach, about 60 kms north of Frankfurt and a number of small towns collectively named the Brachttal, about the same distance north east from Frankfurt in Hessen. There were also one or two Morkels in cities such as Frankfurt, Munich and Dusseldorf. Small towns interested us more because it was more likely that the families would have lived there for generations. I wrote letters to all and received about eight replies. The most interesting response was from Carsten Morkel, then a university student, of Pohlgöns, a small town close to Butzbach. He had traced his family back to about 1610. Through him, I met Herr Meyerhahn the local genealogy enthusiast (retired school teacher) who was entrusted with the
Through Herr Bodo Heil I located an article by Melchior from the Hessen Genealogy Journal where the Morkel family of Butzbach is traced back to 1383, using tax records. The first mention of the family was Markel from Howysel (Hoch-Weisel is today part of Butzbach town), always without a first name, and mentioned first in 1383, and thereafter at regular intervals until 1436 at which time he was worth 170m (mark?) taxable capital, which for that time represented reasonable wealth.
The first time the name is spelled “Morkel” appears in the sixth generation after Markel of Howysel. Emmerich Morkel is listed in 1535 as the younger mayor (jüngerer Bürgermeister), and also in 1548 and 1554. A House-Mark is available for 1535 and 1548. He owned farmland and vineyards in Butzbach. His taxable capital amounted to 360m by 1553. He died in 1554 and was married to Else, who died 1581.
Descendants of Emmerich Morkel also used the spelling Morckel on occasion. However, in the Butzbach church registers the name is consistently spelled Morkel. This is at variance with Arnd’s family from the same area who used the Morckel spelling. Melchior's records continue until 1594, and sadly contain names of several children who died from the plague.
The Thirty Years’ War
Despite some uncertainty, a birth date between 1677 to 1683 for Philip Morkel sounds reasonable.
In what kind of society did he and Willem and before them, their parents, grow up? In the 1500's Germany was a fragmented collection of larger and smaller principalities, cities and lands with considerable independence, within the 'Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation'. According to one source , it consisted of 7 electoral princes, 4 archbishops, 46 bishops, 83 other spiritual leaders, 145 counts and lords and approximately 83 imperial towns. Germany entered a recession in the 1590s, followed by a general downturn in the European economy in the 1610s and 1620s. Social and political tensions erupted in peasant revolts as well as social unrest in towns. Average temperatures dropped with severe crop failures in what has been termed a 'little ice age‘ — captured in the icy winter scenery in paintings of the time. Starvation, destitution, burning of witches and infanticide were not uncommon.
A combination of tensions within the Holy Roman Empire and among the states of Europe produced a confused series of conflicts from 1618 to 1648 known as the Thirty Years’ War' .
The German economy and society were devastated. Various armies marched through the countryside, looting and killing all in their way. The area around Frankfurt and Butzbach was in the centre of these conflicts. Peasants and Farmers lived precarious lives. When they fled to walled cities and towns such as Butzbach for protection, they lacked the ability to raise crops and the congestion caused diseases and the plague. Between one third and two thirds of the population perished. The destruction of buildings and livestock by unpaid troops through foraging and the use of scorched earth policies caused immense damage to an already fragile subsistence economy. Eventually a peace was negotiated in 1648 as the 'Treaty of Westphalia', setting institutions in place which endured until the abolition of the empire in Napoleon's time in 1806.
After the peace of Westphalia, the agony continued. King Louis XIV of France sought to extend his territory north-east and repeatedly attacked the Rhineland after 1674. In the Palatinate, in Baden and Württemberg, towns were burned, crops destroyed or requisitioned and peasants driven from their homes. The Rhineland was to be turned into a desert so that it could not be used as a granary by the enemies of France. Ruins from the French predatory wars were still smouldering when the Hessian states were overrun and devastated anew in the War of Spanish Succession. Again they paid dearly for their strategic position.
Hamburg escaped much of the devastation of the period. It had flourished as part of the Hanseatic League in the 12th century, and remained an active trading post even after the League declined at the end of the Middle Ages. The Hamburg Stock Exchange was founded in 1558, the Bank of Hamburg in 1619 and a protective convoy started in 1662 to protect merchant ships on the open seas. It protected itself by taking a political neutral position while also fortifying itself . Despite the devastating Thirty Years’ War, Hamburg was able to continue to grow in economic importance.
Thus, if the Morkel family lived in Hamburg, they would have escaped much of the hardships of the war and subsequent troubles.
During this time of hardship in Germany, neighbouring Holland experienced a flourishing economy based largely on the VOC (Dutch East India Company) trade in spices and textiles with Batavia and the Far East.
The VOC needed staff, particularly at officer level and the Dutch locals who qualified would have preferred to stay at home (or become top ranking officials in Batavia), leaving the perilous voyages to Germans and Danes, keen for work. The Dutch had a strong relationship with Hamburg which harboured Dutch merchants escaping wars in Holland during the late 1500s and they had a recruiting office there.
Did they want to be found?
Thus far we have found the following:
1. Philip and Willem Morkel are both listed in the VOC records as born in Hamburg. Our search failed to find any trace of Philip, his brother Willem, their parents or any Morkel family in that city at that time.
2. We found about 40 Morkel families living at present in the Hessen countryside near Frankfurt. At least two families could be traced back in Butzbach and neighbouring Pohlgöns and Kirchgöns to the early 1600s, and we found Morkels in Butzbach as far back as 1383.
Perhaps our search in Hamburg was inadequate, and that some time in the future the connection in the Hamburg Archives will be found. But maybe Philip and his brother Willem came from elsewhere, possibly Hessen, and came to Hamburg to join the VOC. At this stage we do not know. The work in Hamburg was quite extensive and done by an experienced archivist. Philip and Willem were both educated and trained in their profession, so they would likely have appeared in documents of the time. Thus there is a probability that the brothers came from elsewhere, such as the Frankfurt region. If so, why did they list Hamburg as their birthplace?
One can only speculate, but it is possible that we could not find Philip and Willem because they did not want to be found. In those days it was not always easy to move, particularly if you served in the army of a feudal lord. If for some reason (and it may have been quite honourable, but not approved by the count) you ‘disappeared’, it may have been best to leave the country and join a ship for far-away lands. The VOC was the foremost employer of the time and recruited in Hamburg. To cover your tracks you gave your place of birth as Hamburg, one of the old Hanseatic league free cities not ruled by a feudal lord. This is speculation but it would explain the absence of any reference to Morkel in the Hamburg archives.
The treaty of Westphalia in 1648 was only partly effective, and unrest continued for many years thereafter. If they were from Hessen, it would have been in this collapsed society that Philip and Willem's parents were born — probably around the 1650's. In spite of the economic hardship of the time, there is evidence that Philip and Willem’s parents were reasonably well off. Philip’s brother, Willem was a surgeon, (chirugijn or opperbarbier) who obtained his medical knowledge through an apprenticeship, and who belonged to a strong Guild with strict rules and demands. Candidates were between 16 and 18 years old and needed parents with sufficient means to pay for a four year apprenticeship . Likewise, Philip as an artillerist would also have been supported by his parents during his training.
It is quite possible that the brothers’ parents would have encouraged their sons to move to a better life. This notion is reinforced by oral tradition within our family, that the two brothers came to the Cape ‘because their father did not want them to serve in the army’. If this is so, then it is somewhat ironic that Philip was employed by the VOC as a soldier, probably because he was trained in that craft. He was a constapel i.e. a gunner and in charge of the gunpowder and guns aboard the ship. At the Cape he served as an artillerist before settling down as a farmer.
Pay rates of the VOC were notoriously poor and the journeys extremely hazardous, even though officers had better food and accommodation than the ordinary seamen and soldiers on board. He was the only crew member apart from the captain that had his own cabin, where the weapons and gunpowder were stored.
Constapel was a middle rank position — better than ordinary seamen but paid the same as a boatswain’s mate and the cook . Somewhat surprising, the constapel was a member of the ship’s crew and not part of the soldiers which were also on the ship. Some ten years later Willem also sailed with the VOC at a higher rate of pay as opperbarbier. Willem completed several journeys and finally retired on brother Philip’s farm Onverwacht at the Cape.
It is plausible that Philip wanted to get out of Germany and signing up with the VOC was his means. He took the first opportunity to leave the ship and settled at the Cape, which at that time was a small unattractive company-dominated settlement. As soon as he could, he resigned from the VOC and took up farming. He had achieved his goals to leave Germany and military life.
Philip arrived at the Cape on the return ship Oosterstein from Batavia in 1708. It is likely that he was on that ship when it left Wielingen, Holland on 13 October 1704. The Oosterstein arrived at the Cape on 7 March 1705 and departed for Batavia on 8 July 1705 . Thus Philip had most likely been at the Cape for four months in 1705. The ship remained in the Far East for 2 years and 4 months probably trading in the region, before returning via the Cape to Holland. It belonged to the Zeeland Chamber of the VOC and sailed out of Wielingen. From Holland to the Cape the ship had to go through the doldrums around the equator with good chance of being becalmed. They had 297 men on board and the voyage to the Cape took 145 days — almost 5 months. Returning from Batavia was quicker, 51 days, with 159 men on board.
Philip married during the 82 days he was at the Cape, returned to Holland in April 1708 on the Oosterstein to arrange his discharge. Philip returned to settle at the Cape on the Noordbeek on 2 February 1709, after a voyage of 136 days. He stayed with the Company at the Cape, as artillerist at the Castle, firing the signalling cannon greeting visiting ships. They would not have used ear-plugs or -muffs and he most likely had hearing problems for the rest of his life.
Written by André Theron Morkel
For the extended Morkel family. To be handed down to kids and grandkids.
For those interested in readable history of prominent as well as often forgotten events and how the family coped. For rugby and cricket enthusiasts about a special family For those wanting a good read. The emphasis is on family history. There are many family trees, but it is primarily a history, not a genealogy.
Book and CD available from Nickey Cilliers Colin Pretorius
Cell no : 0833010813
Email: nickey@futuremanagers.com
