Museum Bronbeek

Museum Bronbeek was founded in 1863 as part of the Colonial Military Home for Disabled. It is situated close to the city of Arnhem and contains a large collection of militaria, as well as ethnographic and other types of objects.

Description

After King William III ceded the Bronbeek estate in Arnhem to the Dutch state in 1862, a home was established there in 1863 for disabled colonial soldiers who had served in the Royal Dutch East Indies Army (KNIL). Many of these former soldiers owned items that had been taken as booty from the battlefield or that they had brought back as souvenirs after their time in Indonesia. In addition, the Ministry of Colonies, members of the royal family and private individuals also donated various militaria such as weapons, banners, medals and portraits. This gave the home a museum function as well.

Until 1959, the home and its museum belonged to the Ministry of Colonies, after which it fell under the then new Ministry of Defence, of which it is still part today. In the 1950s, the objects in the museum were still displayed in the typical nineteenth-century manner: the walls were full of paintings and on either side of a narrow path a large number of objects were displayed. All this changed with a major renovation in 1963, prompted partly by the changing social view of the Dutch colonial past. In the remainder of the twentieth century, too, the museum's layout would change considerably several more times. From 1970, Bronbeek was opened to all former professional soldiers, not just from the KNIL.

In 2024, Museum Bronbeek opened a new permanent display of the collection.

Provenance research

Museum Bronbeek's collection is searchable on the museum's collection website. The library with more than 15,000 books is available through Worldcat. Archives related to Bronbeek can be found at the museum itself, at the Nationaal Archief in The Hague and at the Netherlands Institute for Military History (NIMH).

In 2024, Museum Bronbeek launched a website with 6,000 biographies of Knights in the Military Order of William. In it, various publications on the Military William Order have been collected, supplemented and made available online. It is possible to search by name, year, rank or army unit. Individual pages contain personal information, information on posting and archival references.

Resources

Related items

Keywords

Collectie
Etnographics
Military museum

Geographical

Indonesia

Period of activity

1863 – Present