Batavialand is a museum in Lelystad, the Netherlands, dedicated to Dutch maritime history, water management, and the reclamation of land from the sea. It highlights the country’s deep relationship with water, showcasing how the Dutch have used engineering to manage and control their environment through dams, dikes, and large-scale land Read more…
During World War II, members of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) were involved in a variety of operations, including flying missions on aircraft belonging to the Netherlands East Indies (NEI) Air Force. This cooperation occurred after the fall of the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) to Japanese forces in Read more…
This article was created with the permission of, and with information made available by, Mr. Bijvoet’s grandchildren, Dr. Shanti Wong and Mr. Mark Wardle. Cornelis Bijvoet (1890–1964) was a Dutch shipping engineer who served his country with distinction as a ship designer, a World War II naval officer, and a Read more…
Urgent need to replace aging planes – 162 new planes ordered The Netherlands nor NEI and nor Australia for that matter were well prepared for war. In NEI the ML-KNIL were using the no longer up-to-date Martin bombers (from the Glenn L. Martin Company in the USA). They were the Read more…
On 26 February, a ML-KNIL Douglas Dakota caught fire and crashed into the ocean about 23 minutes into a test flight from Archerfield, killing all six people – three Dutch servicemen and three Australian crew members – onboard. ML-KNIL = Militaire Luchtvaart van het Koninklijk Nederlands-Indisch Leger – Royal Netherlands Read more…
The paper discusses what kind of mutual support and care-giving occurs between Dutch migrants residing in Australia and their parents ‘back home’ in the Netherlands. Specific case study examples are used to document the effect of long-distance, as well as situationally determined factors related to joint family history and past Read more…
The book The Devil’s Grin by Toni Harting provides an in-depth exploration of the Japanese military’s imprisonment of Dutch civilians in the Dutch East Indies during the Pacific War (1941-1945). Harting offers a detailed account of the Japanese occupation, focusing on the brutality endured by prisoners in the concentration camps, Read more…
The following story was told by Les Bryant and recorded in World War II Stories from Brisbane’s South West My aunt was one of MacArthur’s drivers in Brisbane, but her story started overseas. She actually arrived back in Australia about the same time as Macarthur, as an evacuee from the Read more…
I have lived in Forest Lake, Brisbane for years. But during World War 11,-I was in Java. When the Japanese invaded, the Dutch East Indies government escaped to Australia and ended up at Wacol, Brisbane. My family came later, in 1945. Dutch East Indies My grandfather was Polish, and he Read more…
The Gemma Constantiniana is a remarkable artifact – only one of three of the Roman period – that weaves together the stories of ancient Rome, Dutch maritime history, and European royalty. This 4th-century CE sardonyx cameo, created during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great, celebrates the emperor and his Read more…