Zwaanendael House: Lewes icon honors 300 years of failed Dutch settlement

Michael Morgan
Special to Salisbury Daily Times

When noted Wilmington architect, E. William Martin, returned from The Netherlands, he had several sketches “made under great difficulties in rain and hail” and an idea of how to design one of southern Delaware’s iconic buildings.

In the early 20th century, Martin helped to design the Legislative Hall in Dover, a number of schools and other Delaware public buildings.

In 1930, he was commissioned to design a building that would commemorate the 300th anniversary of the arrival of the Dutch colonists in Delaware, and at the same time, be a permanent monument to the first European settlement in Delaware.

With that in mind, Martin set sail for the city of Hoorn in the Netherlands, the hometown of David Pietersen de Vries.

The 88-year-old Zwaanendael Museum commemorates the founding of Delaware's first European settlement by the Dutch in 1631. The terra cotta roof tiles and decorative shutters are fashioned in the same style as those of the city hall in Hoorn, Netherlands.

Born in 1593, David de Vries came from a prominent merchant family during the golden age of The Netherlands. At that time, Dutch ships carried European goods to far-flung ports, Dutch banks handled a major share of Europe’s money, and Dutch artists, such as Rembrandt and Vermeer, painted some of Europe’s greatest masterpieces.

Baruch Spinoza and Rene Descartes were among Europe’s leading thinkers; and Antony van Leeuwenhoek made startling discoveries in science. It was a time when the mania for tulips sent bulb prices sky-rocketing, until a single bulb could be worth as much as an average person could earn in a year.

The Netherlands shared with England a vigorous seafaring heritage and a desire to plant colonies in all parts of the world. David de Vries was just one of the many Dutch entrepreneurs who helped set up colonies in Asia, Africa, and America.

After establishing settlements at Jamestown, Virginia, and Plymouth, Massachusetts, England was poised to take control of the entire North American coast north of Florida. In 1624, the Dutch countered by planting a colony on Manhattan Island; and within a few years, several other settlements were founded on the Hudson River.

Lewes' Zwaanendael Museum.

Buoyed by the success along the Hudson River, several Dutch businessmen joined with De Vries to establish a colony near Cape Henlopen.

In 1631, de Vries and his partners outfitted the ship Walvis to carry the first European settlers to Delaware. While de Vries remained in Holland to gather supplies for the new colony, the Walvis set sail from Holland.

When the Walvis arrived in Delaware Bay, the Dutch colonists lost no time in erecting a wooden stockade on a low bluff opposite the mouth of Lewes Creek.

The colonists named their new settlement, “Swanendael,” Valley of the Swans. Many years later, it became fashionable to call the Dutch settlement near Cape Henlopen, “Zwaanendael,” but that name does not appear in colonial documents.

After the Walvis returned to Holland, de Vries received disturbing news that something catastrophic had happened at the new Dutch colony along Lewes Creek. When de Vries returned to Delaware in late 1632, he discovered that the colony had been destroyed.

The downcast de Vries decided that the Dutch attempt to establish a colony near Cape Henlopen should be abandoned, and after burying the bones of the colonists, he returned to Europe.

Michael Morgan

In the 20th century, to commemorate the tricentenary of the failed Dutch settlement, architect Martin designed a scaled-down building inspired by the town hall at Hoorn.

The Zwaanendael House (now the Zwaanendael Museum) is situated on a plot of land at the intersection of Savanah Road and King’s Highway.

In 1931, the Delaware Coast News, proclaimed, “Nearly everyone familiar with Lewes agrees that the location is ideal. The site selected is in itself historic as it was the site of the first private school (the Lewes Academy) in the State of Delaware.”

Martin made one addition to the Lewes building that was not on the Hoorn Town Hall. He topped the distinctive Dutch-style structure with a statue of David Pietersen de Vries, the entrepreneur behind the first European settlement in Delaware.

Principal sources:

Zwaanendael Museum (Zwaanendael House) |https://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/DE-01-ES23 Delaware, A Guide to the First State, Federal Writers’ Project, New York: The Viking Press, 1938, p. 202.

David Pietersz de Vries, Voyages from Holland to America, 1632-1644, translated by Henry C. Murphy, New York, 1853, pp. 18-19, 23-24, 31-32.

Delaware Coast News, June 12, 1931.

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