Nimmer terugdeinzen

Ik kreeg een email van Jan Tore Hagnes, woonachtig in het Deense Skælrup:

Dear Mr. Hagnes,
Yes, we are namesakes! Could you please give me some information about our family name? Thank you!

Yours, Jan Tore Hagnes.

Hagnes is één van mijn emailnamen. Ik heb hem de gevraagde informatie uiteraard gegeven:

Dear Jan!
Finally a Danish connection! Our family name means Haakneus in Dutch, that is something like Hooknose in English. We meet the first Hagnes in the year 1629: Jeronimus Hagnes. He was a good man, working on the Batavia ship as a first boatsman. The ship went down on the 4th of June 1629, on the Great Barrier Reef near Australia, Jeronimus dying in the act.
Jeronimus was married to Martha Hagnes née Kramberg and they had three sons. The youngest son was Cees Hagnes, and he became Holland’s notorious Axe Killer, murdering at least seven persons of the female sex. He was tried in The Hague and got a life imprisonment without parole. But he escaped from prison and went to Denmark, where he probably killed some more people.
So you must be a direct descendant of Cees Hagnes!
In Holland it is etiquette for descendants of murderers to change your family name. I have chosen Ben Hoogeboom as my name, for I could no longer stand the spewing and shouting when I said Ben Hagnes is my real name. And I have nothing to do with rascal Cees, because I am a descendant of Henry, the first son of Jeronimus! I hope the situation is rather better for you in Denmark.

Yours, Ben Hagnes Hoogeboom.