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John Updike

b. 1708 (Princeton, Sommerset, New Jersey)
m. 11 May 1738 (Sommerset, New Jersey)
d. 1790 (Maidenhead, New Jersey)

Parents:
Lawrence Updike (Opdyck) and Agnietje Post

Grandparents:
Johannes Lourense Opdyck and Catherine Trintye
Wilhelmus Post "William" and Aeltje Teunise Alida

Siblings:
Lawrence Updike, Jr
William Updike
John Updike
Catherine Updike
Rachel Updike
Tunis Updike
Athaliah Updike

Aunts & Uncles:
Married:
Mary Bragaw

Children:
Lawrence Updike
Isaac Updike
Burgoon Updike
William Updike
Mary Updike
Roliph Updike
Jacob Updike (twin)
Abraham Updike (twin)
Peter Updike
John Updike Jr
Sarah Updike
Gysbert Updike

Grandchildren:

NOTE:

"It should be a subject of pride for the descendants of John Updike that they have in their veins such excellent [Bragaw] Huguenot blood."

"We find that the Bragaw family of Newtown were descended from Bourgon Broudard, a French Huguenot [some sources say Walloon] exile who fled from persecution in France to Manheim and thence came with his wife Catherine Lefebre in 1675 to Bushwick, Long Island. He and his wife were among the earliest members of the French Church in New York; in 1688 they moved to Dutch gills near Newtown and purchased there a large tract of land. Their son Isaac Bragaw, born 1676, was taught the trade of a weaver, acquired considerable property at Dutch gills, bought his father's farm in 1713, was a prominent supporter of the Dutch Church, and died 1757, aged 81. His will, on record in N. Y. City Surrogate's Office, mentions his daughter Mary as the wife of "Johannes Opdyke," almost the spelling of the old Johannes Opdyck, who had formerly been a close neighbor of the Broucard or Bragaw family in Newtown, instead of the spelling which the grandson John Updike always used. Isaac Bragaw had, beside Mary, children named Isaac, Peter, Ruloff, and Bergoon ; the last was a very tall and strong man and Captain of the Newtown Militia."





Born about 1708; married 1738 Mary Bragaw of Newtown, Long Island; died 1790 ; was a farmer near Cherry Valley a few miles north of Princeton, N. J., in what was then called " the Western Precinct " or Hillsborough, later Montgomery township in Somerset County, and now Princeton township in Mercer County.

The records show : that he was the second son and executor of his father Lawrence (1748) but did not act as executor; that he brought a suit in Hunterdon in 1730 ; resided in Maidenhead township (where his father lived) in 1730, 2, 4; owned a large tract of land in Somerset Co., north of Princeton, in 1744, 1763, and 1764, through which three roads were laid out; was a landholder in Hillsborough township near Princeton in 1750, and in the same township in 1758 and 1763 ; his tract of land north of Princeton in 1765 was of sufficient importance to be a landmark in a map of the Middlesex and Somerset County Line, although not adjoining it ; he traded at Princeton in 1767-8 ; made his will in 1783 in Somerset Co., and there died in 1790.

The large tract of land, so often above mentioned, was evidently just south of Cherry Valley in Somerset Co., and near the eastern line of Maidenhead and Hopewell townships of Hunterdon Co. He therefore settled and remained almost 50 years only a few miles away from his father's home in Maidenhead, and his tract probably adjoined and possibly included the land , on Stony Brook in Maidenhead, owned by his grandfather Johannes Opdyck.

In the List of Marriage Bonds issued by the Secretary of the State of N. Y., published officially, Vol. 1, 69, appears the marriage of John Updike and Mary Bragaw of Newtown, Long Island, May 11, 1738. In Riker's Annals of Newtown, L. I., we find that the Bragaw family of Newtown were descended from Bourgon Broudard, a French Huguenot exile who fled from persecution in France to Manheim and thence came with his wife Catherine Lefebre in 1675 to Bushwick, Long Island. He and his wife were among the earliest members of the French Church in New York; in 1688 they moved to Dutch gills near Newtown and purchased there a large tract of land. Their son Isaac Bragaw, born 1676, was taught the trade of a weaver, acquired considerable property at Dutch gills, bought his father's farm in 1713, was a prominent supporter of the Dutch Church, and died 1757, aged 81. His will, on record in N. Y. City Surrogate's Office, mentions his daughter Mary as the wife of "Johannes Opdyke," almost the spelling of the old Johannes Opdyck, who had formerly been a close neighbor of the Broucard or Bragaw family in Newtown, instead of the spelling which the grandson John Updike always used. Isaac Bragaw had, beside Mary, children named Isaac, Peter, Ruloff, and Bergoon ; the last was a very tall and strong man and Captain of the Newtown Militia. John Updike may have came back to his grandfather's old home at Newtown to seek a wife for his great plantation in the Jersey wilderness; or he may have met Mary at the houses of her uncles who all moved to Somerset, N. J., where their descendants are now the well-known Brokaws. It should be a subject of pride for the descendants of John Updike that they have in their veins such excellent Huguenot blood. John named his first son Lawrence for his father according to the time-honored custom; and then named four sons for his wife's brothers mentioned above.

In many ways John Updike is an interesting figure. His descendants have been so numerous as to make him the ancestor of more than half the Updikes in America. He forms a midway mark in the emigration of his line to and from New Jersey. In 1697 his grandfather Johannes Opdykk came from Long Island with children and grandchildren in wagons to the richer land of the primeval forests of West Jersey, and there John was born, lived and died; almost precisely a century later, five of John's sons took up the march from New Jersey with their children and grandchildren in covered wagons back again to yet richer lands in New York State, but this time it was to the magnificent Lake Country, recently made safe for settlers by Gen. Sullivan's terrible punishment of the savages of the Five Nations during the Revolution.

Of John's nine sons there remained in New Jersey four, Lawrence, Isaac, William and Peter, and a son of his son Jacob. The descendants of these multiplied so rapidly that a road between Princeton and Hopewell, on which many of them lived, has been known for a century as the "Updike Road," and it became a byword there that twenty-four Updikes could be counted at every local gathering. About 1800, the other five sons of John moved together, or nearly so, to Tompkins County, the richest soil of New York State; and with them went one son of their brother Lawrence; there too in Tompkins County the descendants of these brothers multiplied so rapidly that their neighborhood was called the "Updike Settlement," and the graveyard of the old Log Church near Waterburg, N. Y., is filled with their tombstones. At about the time of this movement to New York State, two sons of Lawrence (the eldest of the nine brothers) moved from New Jersey to Pennsylvania, and from there to Indiana where they left a host of descendants. The later generations of the New Jersey, the New York, and the Indiana group, have continually sought wider fields and are now scattered over all of the Western and Pacific States. The descendants of one group occasionally meet those of another, but have no knowledge of their mutual relationship. But everywhere they have retained the same features and characteristics; they have been long lived, prolific, large, strong, honest, thrifty, and unassuming. The old records of Somerset Co., N. J., do not show a single tavern-license ever issued to an Updike, and scarcely a single Updike as ever appearing in Court proceedings.

The grave of John Updike is not known. It may be in the burial-ground on the old farm of his son William, on the "Updike Road," near Stony Brook and the boundary line of Somerset and Hunterdon Counties, where unlettered headstones mark the old graves.

John Updike's will was not mentioned in the General Index of Wills at Trenton, although referred to by his son Burgoon in a deed in 1793. The author therefore concluded that the will was destroyed with the other old records of Somerset Co. when the British and Tory raiders burned the Millstone court house during the Revolution; and he proceeded to gather all of John's children from other sources. The descendants of William; Peter, and Jacob knew that these three brothers owned farms just where the Road Book showed John's lands to have been; the Somerset Co. records confirmed this and also gave Isaac and John Jr. as adjoining owners; Lawrence, Rolif, Brogan and William served together in the Somerset Militia in the Revolution; Rulif and Abraham testified after the Revolution that Burgoon's property had been taken by British and Continental soldiers, Isaac's will showed that he was brother to Ruliph, Lawrence, Peter and William. The unusual names, of Burgoon and Roliff at least, connected them with John Updike's wife's brothers. The descendants of almost all remembered their great-uncle Burgoon Updike, and Burgoon's deed showed that he was a son of John. Still it was a great satisfaction finally to discover the lost will of John Updike in the vaults of the Secretary of State, and to find that it mentioned by name the same nine sons whom the author had ascribed to John Updike, thus verifying the accuracy of the work.

To the descendants of John Updike the early history of Somerset County must be highly interesting. There, as everywhere else in our country, the rivers were fuller in the last century than now. The Raritan was navigable up to the junction of the North and South Branches, and much of the heavy produce of the farms and mills was carried to market by water. The farmers floated their grain down stream in flat-bottomed boats to New Brunswick, rowing or towing back the next day. All the smaller streams of Somerset and Hunterdon were thickly dotted with mills. Large wagons, often drawn by six horses, passed over the Amwell road to New Brunswick, -as many as 500 vehicles in a single day. In 1748 the Raritan Landing was described as "being a market for the most plentiful wheat country for its bigness in America." New Brunswick hoped to rival New York in importance, and its lots rose to an enormous price.

New Jersey was the battle-field of the Revolution. Washington's army spent two winters at Morristown, one at Middlebrook (Bound Brook), and portions of two summers in Somerset County; the marks of its encampment at Chimney Rock are still visible, and the old houses used by him and his generals as their head-quarters during the winter of 1776-7 at Somerville and Bound Brook are yet standing, fine specimens of colonial architecture. The Jersey troops distinguished themselves on many occasions. The night after the Battle of Princeton, twenty Jersey militia drove off a British detachment of ten times their number, and captured at Kingston a valuable wagon train of woolen clothing, which was welcomed as a god-send by Washington's troops. They often captured boats on the Raritan coming with provisions for Cornwallis's forces at New Brunswick. Near Millstone, four hundred British foragers were badly routed by an equal number of Americans, largely raw Jersey militia. At Piscataway, 1,000 British troops were beaten back by 700 Americans, who were nearly all militia. At Spanktown (Rahway) the British were worsted by the Rebels in two encounters, in one of which the enemy were driven through the snow all the way back to Amboy, with a loss of one. hundred men, while we lost only fifteen. Similar encounters were of frequent occurrence during the Winter and spring of 1777. Washington wrote to Congress: "The Militia of New Jersey,-from this time forward, generally acquired high reputation, and throughout a long and tedious war conducted themselves with spirit and discipline, scarce surpassed by the regular troops." The New Jersey rolls show at least four of John Updike's sons to have been members of the militia thus so highly praised.


Born 1752, died 1827; married Jane Vandervort; was a farmer in Montgomery, Somerset (now Princeton, Mercer), N. J., and in Enfield, Tompkins County, N. Y.

The descendants of the four brothers, Burgoon, Roliph, Abraham and Jacob, who moved together to Tompkins County, N. Y., all remember Abraham as a twin brother of Jacob, and a brother of Burgoon and Roliph; and he is remembered as a brother of William and Peter by the oldest living descendants in New Jersey. The Family Record of a grandson of Jacob Updike shows

"Abraham Updike died March 12, 1827, aged about 75 years."
"Jane, wife of Abraham Updike, died Feb. 11, 1832, aged about 80."
Jacob also is said to have died in 1827, thus fulfilling the popular belief that twins die in the same year."

The records of the old Dutch Church at Harlingen, Somerset Co., N. J., contain an entry of the baptism of a child named Maria in 1775 by " Abraham Opdyke and his wife Jane; " the only entry of the family name on the books of that church. In 1777 Abraham Updike saw the horse of his brother Burgoon in the possession of a Continental officer, and testified to that effect in 1782 when Burgoon made his claim upon the Government for its value. In 1795 Abraham and John Jr. were witnesses for Jacob Updike of Montgomery township, Somerset, in buying a farm in Hunterdon County. These, and that in his father's will, are all the mentions which have been found of Abraham on the New Jersey records.

The date of the removal of Abraham and his brothers to the Lake Country is variously stated. A memorial notice of Abraham G. Updike, published in the Trumansburg Sentinel in 1881, says that Abraham G. was not a year old when his grandfather brought him from New Jersey; this would make the year 1800. A grandson of Jacob writes that Jacob and his twin brother Abraham moved together to Tompkins County in 1802. But the slight difference in date is unimportant.

Mr. Rensselaer Updike, of Schuyler County, N. Y., a great-grandson of Abraham, writes thus:

"My great-grandfather Abraham, with his three sons Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, named after the old patriarchs, came from New Brunswick or, Trenton, N. J., in company with other Updikes, and all settled near each other in Tompkins County. The place was called the Updike Settlement. My great-grandfather died m 1827, the year in which I was born. When the Updikes came in to this country, it was all a howling wilderness. They must have been of a religious cast, as the records show that they were among the first to build a church, which was of logs like their dwellings; the seats were made of slabs with holes bored for the legs. I remember going there in the days of my childhood, to meeting. In regard to the characteristic traits of the old Updikes of this State, they ranked among the best of farmers, but were not aspiring for rank or position. In stature they were above the medium height, many of them over six feet; square and strongly built, with regular features; of a gleeful, mirthful, yet go-ahead disposition as a rule, moral and religious."

Mr. Samuel Updike of Grass Lake, Michigan, a grandson of Abraham, writes:

"My grandfather Abraham and his two brothers, Jacob and Burgoon, In the Spring of 1802 when the four patriarch brothers, Burgoon, Roliph, Abraham and Jacob Updike, set out from New Jersey in teams and on horseback with their families, their flocks and their herds, for what was then known as the Far West, (soon to be followed by a fifth brother John Jr., and later by two sons of another brother Lawrence and a son of a seventh brother William, all to settle in Tompkins Co., N. Y.), the last covered wagon of the long procession brought a little grandson in his mother's arms, whom she had named ABRAHAM GROVER UPDIKE for his grandfathers.

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