Anthony Thomas Van Bergen (January 7, 1827 – February 18, 1912) was a prominent and wealthy American businessman who lived in Paris.
Early life
Van Bergen was born on January 7, 1827, in
New Baltimore, New York, and grew up at the Van Bergen homestead there.[1] He was the youngest son of ten children born to Clarine (
née Peck) Van Bergen (1785–1872) and
Anthony Van Bergen, a judge and
Democrat who represented
Greene County in the
New York State Assembly and served as the first president of the
New York State Agricultural Society.[2] Among his siblings were Lucy Ann Van Bergen (wife of the Rev. Leonard Bronk Van Dyck);[1] Peter A. Van Bergen (who married Lucy A. Smart);[1] Esther Van Bergen (wife of Stephen J. Matson);[1] Rebecca Smith Van Bergen (wife of Roswell Read Jr.);[3] Maria Van Bergen (who died unmarried);[1] John Peck Van Bergen (who married Margaret Baker, a daughter of the
GovernorJoshua Baker);[1] and James Oliver Van Bergen (who married Harriet Lay).[1]
Van Bergen moved to
Brooklyn Heights with his brother John Peck Van Bergen.[9] He worked for the
Arnold Constable & Co., a department store chain in the New York City. He permanently moved to Paris where he became the representative of the firm abroad under his firm, A. Van Bergen & Company of New York.[10] All three of his children were born in Paris. He was also the foreign representative for the
Equitable Life Assurance Society, a large American insurance company,[4] for which he served on the board of directors for many years.[11] He was an American Commissioner to the
Paris exhibitions of 1878 and
1889.[12]
On July 21, 1864, Van Bergen was married to Julia Augusta Peirson (1843–1897) in
Isleworth,
London. Julia was a daughter of Julia Frances and Charles Peirson of
Arnold Constable & Co.[4] They lived at 118
Champs-Élysées in Paris and were the parents of three children:[1]
Charles Peirson Van Bergen (1869–1944),[13] a
University of Paris trained physician who married Amelia Louise "Millie" Thorn (1871–1923),[14] a daughter of Francis Shaw Thorn and Georgianna (née Stevenson) Thorn, in
Buffalo, New York, in December 1896;[15] he lived at 869
Delaware Avenue in Buffalo and a mansion in Paris.[6] He remarried and moved to
Glendale, California.[13]
His wife died in Paris on November 21, 1897. Van Bergen died at his home on Champs-Élysées in Paris on February 18, 1912.[4][28] They were both buried at St. Peter and St. Paul Churchyard in
Pettistree in
Suffolk, England.
Descendants
Through his second son Harry, he was a grandfather of four, including Suzanne Ethel Van Bergen (1902–1977), Anthony Harry Van Bergen (1904–1968), Alice Van Bergen (1909–2005) (who married Charles William Francis Busk in India in 1934), and Edith Florence Van Bergen (1913–1999).[20]