Emigrants from Aalten to the US
In the 19th century, thousands of Achterhoekers emigrated to the United States in search of land, freedom and new opportunities. Among them was the Huinink family from Dale.
Derk Willem Huinink was born on March 9, 1827 on the farm the (Oude) Maas in the rural district of Dale in Aalten. He was a son of Jan Berend Huinink and Berendina Heesen. His father initially worked as a teacher, but later switched to farming. The couple had five sons and two daughters. Mother Berendina died on August 1, 1848.
Derk Willem attended primary school and helped on the parental property. At the age of seventeen he learned the weaver’s trade, which he combined with work on the farm for ten years.
On 28 May 1858 he married Catharina Jentink, daughter of Hendrik Jan Jentink and Dora Hendrika Lammers. She was also born in Dale, on November 20, 1834. She was one of ten children, four sons and six daughters, six of whom emigrated with their parents to the New World. The Jentink family settled in Lima, Wisconsin.
Derk Willem’s sister, Janna Willemina Huinink, married Jan Berend Schepers on the same day.
Emigration to America
In the summer of 1869, Derk Willem, his father, wife and children left via Liverpool on the steamship Nestorian to North America. After eleven days, they arrived in Quebec and traveled on to Sheboygan County. On July 25, they reached Amsterdam (Sheboygan County). In the spring of 1870, Huinink bought 72 acres (29 hectares) of land in section 19 for $2,000. Later he added another 5 acres (2 hectares).
Family life and work
Derk Willem and his wife built up a thriving farm with hard work. They had nine children:
- Jan Berend (born 20 May 1859), businessman in Cedar Grove
- Dora Hendrika (Aalten, 22 June 1861), married to farmer John Lohuis
- Hendrik Jan (born 15 October 1863), cheesemaker in Cedar Grove
- Christiaan (born 22 April 1866), veterinarian
- Berendina Gesiena (born 22 April 1868), married Harry Scott
- John William (born June 3, 1871), first child born in America
- Garret John (Cedar Grove, 25 May 1875)
- Catherina Wilhelmina (Cedar Grove, 6 December 1876)
- Derk William Jr. (Holland, 30 July 1880)
Community and death
The Huinink family (also spelled Huenink in America) was a member of the Presbyterian Church. Derk Willem played an active role in this and was an elder for more than nineteen years. Both he and his sons voted politically for the Republican Party, which was common among Protestant immigrants in the Midwest at the time.
Derk Willem Huinink died in Cedar Grove in 1911 and Catharine four years later. They are both buried at Presbyterian Cemetery in Holland, Sheboygan.
