Margaretha Oudshoorn is my great-grandmother, the mother of my grandfather on my mother's side. Margaretha, or Griet for short, was born on September 6th, 1881 in Ouder-Amstel, the Netherlands. She was the fifth child and only daughter of Jan Oudshoorn and Johanna Hoetmer. Ze was named after her grandmother on father's side, Margaretha Hoetmer, who died very young. She died after childbirth at the age of 32. She just had her fourth child, a daughter named Margaretha Oudshoorn. This girl died ten weeks later. The name had a lot of painfull memories.

Margaretha's mother was Johanna Hoetmer. Her father was a brother of the Margaretha Hoetmer I just described. They both were the children of Jacob Hoetmer and Maria van Veeren. This couple were the great-grandparents of our Margaretha Oudshoorn through two ways!

family

So Margaretha was the only daughter. Her brother Jan died a bit over a year before she was born. In 1885 another Jan was born. This Jan also didn't become very old. He died in 1897 at the age of approximately twelve years. So Margaretha grew up with three older brothers, Maarten, Jacob and Johannes. Her oldest brother being ten years older than she was. He married in 1892.

Her mother died in 1898 at the age of 58. Margaretha married October 30th, 1903 in the small village of Nederhorst den Berg. She married Hendrik Matthezing, who was a bleecher of clothes at the time. Nederhorst den Berg had a lot of launderettes at the time, being positioned between lakes. Hendrik was four years older than Margaretha. Ten months after their marriage their first child was born, a daughter they named Dorothea Mina, after Hendrik's mother. Then came three boys, Jan, Hendrik and Maarten followed by another daughter, Catharina Maria. Jacob, Johanned, my grandfather, Johanna and Arie followed after that. In 1923 the last child was born, a son named David. He died three months later. Margaretha's husband died suddenly in 1935 as a result of heart problems. He was 58 years old.

Margaretha Oudshoorn is de grandmother of my mother. My grandfather being the seventh child. A lot of the granddaughters of Margaretha were named after her, as was the case back than. The older sister of my mother was also named Margaretha, 'Greet' for short. Margaretha thought this was very important and she treated the 'Greets' different from the other grandchildren. My mother was named after her other grandmother and that grandmother didn't treat them differently. She also only had two grandchildren, my mother and her sister. Grandma Oudshoorn had broken her finger once apparently and it was a bit crooked. My mother told me that her grandmother pointed at her with the crooked finger and said: "why don't you go to your own grandmother?"

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