Journey to His Past

Anyone who has done Dutch research has come across names similar to  van den Bos.  The van and den part of the name are prefixes.

Prefixes are common with Dutch surnames.  Some of the common prefixes are de, der, den, van, te, ter, ten.  Combinations of these prefixes can be found also:  van den, van der, etc.  Kirk's dutch heritage has a variety of these prefixes in their surnames.

van den Bos is one of those surnames.  van means 'from'; den means 'the'.  So van den Bos means 'from the Bos'.  Bos is bunch or bundle.  van den Bos means 'from the bunch (or bundle).  The van den Bos family in Kirk's family tree comes from Sint Philipsland, Zeeland, Netherlands.

One of the interesting things about dutch names with prefixes is that the name is alphabetized in dutch search engines and dutch records without the prefix.  If searching a Dutch surname with a prefix in an online Netherlands search engine, search without the prefix(es).  When I search for van den Bos, I search for Bos.  A few of the online search engines provide a separate space for the prefixes.  If looking at registers that are alphabetized, I would look in the 'B' section, for those records in the Netherlands.  In the United States records, I have found them alphabetized by the 'V'.

Kirk's van den Bos, which became VandenBos in the United States, ancestry is:

Kirk Leyndyke
James Leyndyke
Peter LeynDyke (1894-1991)

The following van den Bos family members were all born in Sint Philipsland, Zeeland, Netherlands.

Neeltje 'Nellie' van den Bos (1877-1910)
Marinus 'Martin' van den Bos (1856-1916)
Cornelis van den Bos (1825-)
Marinus van den Bos (1793-1865)
Johannes van den Bos (abt 1759-1829)


Arend van den Bos (no sources for dates yet.)