Anna Berkhoven (Brouwer) Hilton

The woman known as in community-based recources as "Anna Van Berkhoven" was the second wife of Albany patriarch William Hilton and the matriarch of the Albany Hilton family.

It appears that she was the daughter of New Netherland pioneers Adam and Magdalena Verdon Brouwer. Thus, she would have grown up as a younger child in the very large family of a German-ancestry miller who settled in Brooklyn and died in 1693.

Anna married widower William Hilton at the Albany Dutch church in April 1693. The marriage record stated that she was "of New York." Their first child was baptized three days later. By 1708, seven more chrildren had been christened at the Albany church.

These Hiltons made their home on the Southside of Albany - the residence of choice for a number of soldier families. William Hilton was a would-be trader who may have opened the family inn that became an Albany landmark for many decades.

Anna Brouwer (Berkhoven) Hilton lost her husband in 1749. She may have been the "Widow Hilton" named on a census of Albany householders in 1756. Four other Hilton-named households were configured on that survey. We seek information on her passing.

Sources: The life of Anna Brouwer (Van Berkhoven) Hilton is CAP biography number 8372. This somewhat speculative and tentative sketch is derived chiefly from family and community-based resources.