Jerez, Spain, 1877: greatgrandfather Cornelis Dasse Keppel Hesselink
Late August my 'geneaology cousin' Gijs and I visited the 'Iconografisch Bureau' in the Hague. It is a kind of portrait archive with thousands of portraits of Dutch people through the ages. We were curious if we could find portraits there of long forgotten relatives that we didn't have yet (and together we have quite a few, as you may know!).
We did find some and one surprising find was this gorgeous dress up portrait of our great-grandfather in Spain. There is lots to tell about it and usually I would get right into that but this time I will limit myself to translating the explanatory notes cousin Gijs wrote about this portrait on his website:
"The young man in this photograph was visiting Jerez in the south of Spain in 1877, you know, the town known for its sherries and delicious red wines. There he dressed up in a local Spanish outfit (real touristy, right?) to be literally immortalized (can't you say that after 130 years?)
Note the special headdress. (talk about moorish influences in that region, even then! -docman-)
What was a young man, 25 years old, from Zutphen, the Netherlands doing there? I can tell you that he went there as a starting out winedealer, eager to find out about the business (which his father was into as well, by the way).
Maybe the trip had a pleasant private aspect as well. He married that same year and it is quite possible that the young couple used the trip also as their honeymoon.
Be that as it may, together with his older brother he was having some BIG plans for the business. It was to be a wine wholesale business, delivering sherries and Spanish and Portuguese wines in large quantities to businesses rather than individual consumers. Money wasn't the problem; his rich father-in-law had given him a large sum on his wedding day. And not only to him: said father-in-law had given the same amount (it is rumored to be the then immense sum of 100.000 guilders...!) twice because his brother had married the bride's sister. So they were brothers as well as brothers-in-law! Wasn't that convenient...!
The wholesale business did come off the ground in the big way they had envisioned. The brothers were partners in their monumental offices on Arnhem's Market Street (I think in the same spot where now the Gelderland archives are located). In Jerez de la Frontera they had an office as well. Business was booming and everybody was happy.
Until problems arose, that is. The brothers started disagreeing, quarrelling, fighting... The story goes that at some point they only communicated in the office by throwing wads of paper at eachother.
I (= cousin Gijs -docman) don't know exactly what the background of this fight was but I do have my suspicions and I think the reasons were more private than business-related. In any case their problems were never resolved and the business went into a decline. His marriage didn't last either; after 25 years it ended in divorce.
The young man in the picture is my greatgrandfather
Cornelius Dasse Keppel Hesselink (1852-1917), his wife was Egberta Engberts (1853-1936) from Vriezenveen, his father-in-law Engbertus Engberts(1798-1871), who had made his fortune in trading with St. Petersburg, Russia. His older brother and partner was Willem Frederik Keppel Hesselink (1846-1927). After 1884 the brothers gave up the double family name and just called themselves Hesselink. Other relatives (amongst whom their father, Herman Gijsbert Keppel Hesselink, 1811-1888) also had wine businesses in Arnhem under the name Keppel Hesselink and the two brothers wanted to avoid any confusion about who was who."
Thanks, Gijs!
Jerez, Spain, 1877: greatgrandfather Cornelis Dasse Keppel Hesselink
Late August my 'geneaology cousin' Gijs and I visited the 'Iconografisch Bureau' in the Hague. It is a kind of portrait archive with thousands of portraits of Dutch people through the ages. We were curious if we could find portraits there of long forgotten relatives that we didn't have yet (and together we have quite a few, as you may know!).
We did find some and one surprising find was this gorgeous dress up portrait of our great-grandfather in Spain. There is lots to tell about it and usually I would get right into that but this time I will limit myself to translating the explanatory notes cousin Gijs wrote about this portrait on his website:
"The young man in this photograph was visiting Jerez in the south of Spain in 1877, you know, the town known for its sherries and delicious red wines. There he dressed up in a local Spanish outfit (real touristy, right?) to be literally immortalized (can't you say that after 130 years?)
Note the special headdress. (talk about moorish influences in that region, even then! -docman-)
What was a young man, 25 years old, from Zutphen, the Netherlands doing there? I can tell you that he went there as a starting out winedealer, eager to find out about the business (which his father was into as well, by the way).
Maybe the trip had a pleasant private aspect as well. He married that same year and it is quite possible that the young couple used the trip also as their honeymoon.
Be that as it may, together with his older brother he was having some BIG plans for the business. It was to be a wine wholesale business, delivering sherries and Spanish and Portuguese wines in large quantities to businesses rather than individual consumers. Money wasn't the problem; his rich father-in-law had given him a large sum on his wedding day. And not only to him: said father-in-law had given the same amount (it is rumored to be the then immense sum of 100.000 guilders...!) twice because his brother had married the bride's sister. So they were brothers as well as brothers-in-law! Wasn't that convenient...!
The wholesale business did come off the ground in the big way they had envisioned. The brothers were partners in their monumental offices on Arnhem's Market Street (I think in the same spot where now the Gelderland archives are located). In Jerez de la Frontera they had an office as well. Business was booming and everybody was happy.
Until problems arose, that is. The brothers started disagreeing, quarrelling, fighting... The story goes that at some point they only communicated in the office by throwing wads of paper at eachother.
I (= cousin Gijs -docman) don't know exactly what the background of this fight was but I do have my suspicions and I think the reasons were more private than business-related. In any case their problems were never resolved and the business went into a decline. His marriage didn't last either; after 25 years it ended in divorce.
The young man in the picture is my greatgrandfather
Cornelius Dasse Keppel Hesselink (1852-1917), his wife was Egberta Engberts (1853-1936) from Vriezenveen, his father-in-law Engbertus Engberts(1798-1871), who had made his fortune in trading with St. Petersburg, Russia. His older brother and partner was Willem Frederik Keppel Hesselink (1846-1927). After 1884 the brothers gave up the double family name and just called themselves Hesselink. Other relatives (amongst whom their father, Herman Gijsbert Keppel Hesselink, 1811-1888) also had wine businesses in Arnhem under the name Keppel Hesselink and the two brothers wanted to avoid any confusion about who was who."
Thanks, Gijs!