Willem Kieft was the oldest son of Gerrit Willemszoon Kieft, a merchant living on the Oude Zyde, Voorburgwal, Amsterdam, and of Machteld Huydecoper, daughter of Jan Jacobszoon Bal alias Huydecoper, the well-known magistrate of Amsterdam. He appears to have been born between September 6 and September 13, 1597 in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Kieftwas brought up to be a merchant and removed to La Rochelle, France. Before long his business failed and he is said to have gone to the Ottoman Empire to ransom some Christians, but he set free only those for whom the least had been paid, hoping to get more money for the prisoners he left behind. His relatives in Amsterdam helped him to secure a post in New Netherland. In May 1637 the Dutch West India Company secured permission from the States-General in The Hague to dismiss Van Twiller and appoint Willem Kieft in his place as director of New Netherland.
On September 2, 1637, Kieft appeared in The Hague and took the oath of office. He left Holland on the Harinck, which set sail at the end of September 1637 but did not reach New Amsterdam until March 28, 1638. Upon his arrival in New Amsterdam, Kieft found the city in a dilapidated condition, with the fort practically useless and all the ships except one unserviceable. He immediately assumed absolute control of the colony, and although he permitted the existence of a council, he himself dominated it. He ordered a number of reforms to be made in the civil administration, the police system, and the military force.
In 1641 he levied contributions on the Indians living near New Amsterdam. The Raritans revenged themselves by destroying one of the outlying colonies, while many other settlements were similarly wiped out during the following four years. Some of these were English colonies within the borders of New Netherland, such as those of Anne Hutchinson and of the Reverend Francis Doughty. Between 1639 and 1644 there were only five months of peace. The climax came on February 25 and 26, 1643, when, at the instigation of Kieft, eighty Indians were murdered. In 1642 Kieft had dissolved the Board of Twelve Men and had prohibited public meetings without his consent. When the people began to place all the blame of the Indian massacre upon him, he finally asked them to meet, whereupon they elected a Board of Eight Men to consider conditions in the benighted colony. Kieft was still held guilty of hypocrisy, impudence, and self-aggrandizement. Complaints were sent to the States-General in Holland. Then (1645) Stuyvesant, director of the Dutch West Indies, who happened to reside in the Netherlands, was appointed to displace Kieft, who had in the meantime been attacked by Bogardus, the Dutch preacher at New Amsterdam.
On August 16, 1647, Kieft left America in the Princes, carrying with him a store of various minerals which he had collected in the Dutch colony. Bogardus and seventy-nine others were also on the ship. As it neared the British Isles, it was wrecked on the Welsh coast on Septeber 27, 1647. Only twenty passengers were saved. Kieft was among the dead. In New Netherland the news of his death caused little regret, and in New England it was viewed as a judgment of God. It should be observed, however, that Kieft's faults are generally exaggerated by American historians. The impartial critic can say no more than that he was imprudent in his treatment of the Indians, represented the autocratic tendencies prevailing in Dutch municipal governments, and therefore was confronted by popular indignation in America which he misunderstood. He resorted to abusive language in defending his policies and was consequently an unsatisfactory governor, causing great financial loss to his superiors in Holland and innumerable hardships to his subjects.
