Anna Knickerbacker Van Vechten

Anna Knickerbacker was born in November 1735. She was the eldest daughter of Wouter and Elizabeth Fonda Knickerbacker. She grew up in a large family engaged primarily in agriculture in Albany and in its countryside.

In December 1757, she married Schaghticoke resident Cornelis Van Vechten at the Albany Dutch church. By 1773, six children had been christened in Albany where she remained a pewholder well into the 1790s. Perhaps, another four babies were baptized in churches elsewhere in Albany County.

These Van Vechtens appear to have started out in Albany but also held land in the manor, at Schaghticoke, and also in the town of Saratoga where they ultimately made their home.

Cornelis Van Vechten was a prominent revolutionary - a colonel in the militia whose Saratoga home was burned by the British in 1777. Later, he served in the State Assembly and was chosen clerk in Schaghticoke in 1794. At that time, their household was configured on the census in Saratoga. It included seven family members and was attended by ten slaves.

Anna Knickerbacker Van Vechten is said to have died at the end of December in 1809.

Sources: The life of Anna Knickerbacker Van Vechten has no CAP biography number. This sketch is derived chiefly from family and community-based resources.