My mother's side stems from Belgium, when General Andres van Severen (the first picture), an engineer in the Belgian Royal Court of Princess Maria Carlota Amelia, was tasked to build a railroad across Mexico.Daughter of Leopold I of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, king of Belgium, and Louise of France, the Princess married the archduke of Austria, younger brother of the Hapsburg Austrian Emperor Francis Joseph I, on July 27, 1856.
In 1864, Maximilian and Carlota arrived in Mexico, placed on the throne by Napoleon III as Emperor and Empress of Mexico. (Her father had been offered the Mexican throne and rejected it, years earlier.) Maximilian and Carlota believed that they had the support of the Mexican people. But nationalism in Mexico was running high, and soon the Mexican people rejected foreign rule. When Maximilian refused to leave after the French troops pulled out, the Mexican forces arrested the imposed Emperor.
This is when Andres high-tailed it to El Salvador.
The Princess in the meantime went to Europe to attempt to gain support for her husband, but during that time, she slipped into a serious depression. Maximilian was executed (June 10, 1867). Carlota lived in seclusion for the last nearly sixty years of her life in Belgium and Italy, never recovering her mental health.
Old Andres married, and had two children, Estanislao and Adela (pictured here as well). Estanislao is my great-grandfather. And this is why many of my cousins have light eyes and blond hair.
8 comments:
well! That explains everything.
I'm really liking these historic accounts of everyone's families. We're all such a small part of a grander picture. And I think unless you attempt to understand it, you'll barely be able to understand yourself.
The world in time is so big.
Thank-you carlos.
This makes me more curious about my own mysterious family history. Imagine if we could connect the dots (like a GPS-hehe) and find the degrees of separation between all our ancestors. I'd hope I was related to someone who did that nice charcoal portrait of great uncle "whatshisface". (Which picture goes with whom?) And the paper for the portrait was cut on a Rene style Mexicutter... and so on.
Sur l'article de André Van Severen!
Hello,
I'm looking for any informations concerned André Van Severen, belgian general, borned in Belgium and died the 9/6/1888 in San Salvador and all the Van Severen
living there.
This is for my personal ancestry file and my ancestors are the family Van Severen...
Thank you for any idea, help or informations you can provide to me.
Michel.vandevelde@aximaservices.be
Regards,
Michel Van De Velde
(Brussels, Belgium)
I have information about Andres Van Severen.
Could Michel Van de Velde and Quitmoanez contact me?
Andries Van den Abeele
Bruges (Belgium)
abeele@skynet.be
I wrote to Michel Van de Velde and got the message back!, I am a great grand daughter of Andres Van Severen and live in El Salvador, my e-mail addresses are: unicap@integra.com.sv and annabelladaglio@gmail.com
On the article, the picture of "Antonio" is not Antonio, he is "Estanislao", my grand father, son of Andres Van Severen.
I hope to hear from you soon.
Correction to the children of Andres Van Severen had in El Salvador,5 children, as follows:
1.Andrés, married Carlota Sosa and had Carlos, Andrés, Julia and Tula
2. Alfredo, died single and apparently left one daughter
3. Estanislao (born August 15, 1831 and died on May 12, 1934)married Julia Soria Rochac and had 3 children Adela, Martha and Mario.
4. Adela married Carlos Dueñas and had 4 children Carlos, Tere de Bhuler,Hector and Ricardo.
5. Julia married Julio Lewy and had Herbert, Mario, Julia, Lilly and Rudy
Mr. Abeele, as you can see in the contacts above can give you more information, specially from Belgium.
The corrections have been made.
:)
Hello!
This is very interesting and helpful. I am looking for all the information I could on Andres since he is my husbands great-great grandfather. He is from Andres' daughter Julias' side. No one has a picture of him that we know of and this is such a great one. Do you think I can have a close up copy? my email is elda7@hotmail.com
Thanks so much!
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