More examples: Van Cortland ( a once great Park and area in upper Manhattan ), Van Dijik ( which in NYC became Van Dyke as in an expressway ), and Van Vleit ( middle name of an idiot NYC mayor in the '60s ); all of which are "soft" sounding names.
But now the "named" perp isn't the "perp", so this is all now really off topic.
given =giving
Van Cortlandt, another RevWar name. IMO all of those names are “hard”, not soft. ;-)
But again, we digress and have hijacked the thread...