Den Haag Lists of Freeburgers

The original object of this project was to see if the originals of the Western Cape Archives VC Muster roll transcripts could be found in the Netherlands National Archives at the Hague (for the VC Muster Rolls see Muster Rolls).

In the Netherlands National Archives (Nationaal Archief, Den Haag) is a class of records know as the 'Ingekomen Stukken' from the Cape of Good Hope. Each year the administration at the Cape sent a bundle of letters and reports to the Central Administration in the Netherlands, presumably with the return fleet. Each of these bundles of documents was accompanied by an inventory of the documents included. Corney has copied and read through, in microfilm format, all the Inventories from 1655 to 1683. Many, if not most of these state that their bundles contain 'Lijste van alle de vrijeluijden ... ' but only two have been found to still contain their lists, that of 1672-73 and 1678-79. These two confirm that these are certainly what were transcribed as the VC Muster Rolls - since there are transcripts for many more years the originals seem to have disappeared from the Hague Archives in the meantime - at all events they are not to be found in the microfilmed versions.

In addition the 1681-82 bundle of documents contains a Vrijboek, list of Freeburgers and their financial transactions with the VOC, also presented below.