Papers of John Adams, volume 14
Mr De Hogendorp2 a Lieutenant in the Dutch Guards, in the Service of the Republick of Holland, is going to America in the Suite of Mr Vanberckel the Dutch Minister and I am requested by Some respectable Gentlemen to give him Letters of Introduction to Some Persons in America. any Civilities you may please to Shew him, will be gratefully acknowledged, by / Sir your most obedient and / most humble servant
RC (private owner, 1987); internal address: “His Excellency John Hancock Esqr.”
JA wrote a similar introductory letter of this date to James Warren (Nationaal Archief:Hogendorp Family Archives). Hogendorp thanked JA for the introductions in a letter of 13 June (Adams Papers).
Gijsbert Karel van Hogendorp, future Dutch statesman and relative of Van Berckel, sailed with the squadron carrying the Dutch minister to America. But while Van Berckel's vessel the Overijssel reached Philadelphia on 9 Oct., the Erfprins, with Hogendorp on board, lost its mast in a gale and foundered off the coast of Massachusetts on 21 Nov. with the loss of 303 men. Hogendorp was one of forty men who left the ship in two boats to rendezvous with a passing vessel minutes before the sinking (Schulte Nordholt, Dutch Republic and Amer. Independence
, p. 253, 258–262; Smith, Letters of Delegates
, 21:494, 516–517; vol. 13:198–199; Boston Evening-Post, 29 Nov.; Pennsylvania Evening Post, 16 Dec.; see also Dumas’ letter of 23 May, and note 2, above).