75 years of Moluccan history lives on in the life story of Amsterdam

In April and May 1951, four ships docked in Amsterdam, filled with Moluccan soldiers and their families. They had served for years in the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army and thought they would temporarily reside in the Netherlands. What awaited them, however, was different. Discharge from the military, years in isolated residential camps, and an uncertain future in a foreign land.

The Moluccans who came to the Netherlands in 1951 were primarily former soldiers of the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL). This colonial army of the Netherlands fought during and after World War II against the Indonesian independence movement. The first ship arrived in Rotterdam on March 21, 1951.

Moluccans in the military

Dutch officers considered Moluccan soldiers loyal and reliable. Many Moluccans were Protestant-Christian due to the Dutch colonial presence on the islands. As a result, they often felt more connected to the Netherlands than to the nationalist movement that had emerged mainly on Java.

Unsafe situation

After the proclamation of the Republic of Indonesia (1945) and the end of the Indonesian War of Independence (1949), the KNIL was disbanded. Soldiers could transfer to the Indonesian army, but many Moluccan soldiers did not want to. They were therefore incorporated into the Dutch army and stationed on Java.

South Moluccan Republic

When the South Moluccas seceded from Indonesia, the Moluccans were trapped. They could not return to the Moluccas because they were at war with Indonesia, but for the same reason, they could not stay in Indonesia. The Netherlands decided to temporarily bring over the 3,578 Moluccan soldiers and their families. Some chose this voluntarily. Others were forced.

Discharged from the military

Scarcely had the Moluccan soldiers arrived in the Netherlands when they faced their first setback. The Dutch military discharged them. They lost their military status and their income. Many soldiers could barely read the dismissal letter. Their Dutch was limited, and they did not fully understand what had happened to them.

Betrayed

The soldiers felt betrayed by the Dutch state and took the matter to court. The judge acknowledged that the collective dismissal was legally problematic. Yet this did not lead to rehabilitation of their military status. The Dutch state broke a promise without restoring the consequences.

Residential camps

The Moluccans were housed across the Netherlands, including in former World War II camps. These so-called residential camps were small and primitive, with shared showers and a central kitchen. Work outside the camp was not encouraged, as both the government and the Moluccans assumed the soldiers would eventually return. As a result, families grew up for years in an environment where life seemed to stand still.

Navy men

In Amsterdam, things unfolded differently. While most of the Moluccans who came to the Netherlands were former KNIL soldiers, there were also about 80 to 100 men (and their families) who belonged to the Royal Netherlands Navy. These navy men were not discharged and were assigned regular rental homes. In the naval city of Den Helder, the village of Loosdrecht where the navy training camp was located, and in Amsterdam. After all, this was where the Marine Terrain was.

‘Ordinary’ neighborhoods

The marines and their families lived here in ‘ordinary’ neighborhoods, including Slotermeer and around Kattenburg. Their children grew up among Amsterdam neighbors, attended Dutch schools, and naturally moved between two worlds. While life in the residential camps was marked by waiting, in Amsterdam a daily existence emerged where adaptation and contact were inevitable.

Second generation

In the 1960s, the second generation of Moluccans grew up realizing that the promised return would never happen and that the Netherlands had let their parents down. A growing political mobilization emerged. Young people organized meetings, demonstrations, and discussions about the future of the Moluccas and the role of the Netherlands. Frustration grew when it became clear that the Netherlands did not support the independence of the Republic of the South Moluccas.

Hostage-taking

For many young people, it felt as though their community was caught between two states: an Indonesia where they were not safe, and a Netherlands that did not recognize their political cause. This exploded in Amsterdam on December 4, 1975, when seven armed Moluccan youths occupied the Indonesian consulate between Koninginneweg and Valeriusstraat. They did so to support the Moluccans who had hijacked a train near Wijster two days earlier.

Fatal victim

They took about 50 children and adults hostage. Four consulate employees escaped. One was shot in the stomach by the hostage-takers. Another tried to jump onto a mattress placed under a window by local residents but missed and fell. He died a few days later from his injuries. The hostage-taking ended on December 19. The hostage-takers received prison sentences of up to seven years.

Youths raised in the Netherlands

The young people who occupied the consulate had grown up in the Netherlands. Yet they chose to take up arms for the South Moluccan Republic. The occupation of the consulate was an act by people born in the Netherlands, in a situation created by the Netherlands.

Train hijacking

In 1977, another attack followed. A train was hijacked near De Punt. At the same time, a primary school in Bovensmilde was occupied, with more than 100 children as hostages. The navy ended the hijacking by force. Six hijackers and two hostages died. The shock was immense.

Moluccan Evangelical Church

Churches and organizations in Amsterdam became crucial places for the Moluccan community and identity. A notable example is the Moluccan Evangelical Church (Geredja Indjili Maluku) Gunung Batu. Children sat on wooden benches, elders recounted their arrival in the Netherlands, and families sang hymns they had learned from their grandparents. Outside the church, the city looked as it always did, but within these walls, Moluccan history lived on. The church was a place where children were raised and where traditions were passed down.

Spread across the city

The Moluccan presence in Amsterdam was often found in small things. In kitchens where the smell of trassi led to discussions with neighbors, but where friendships formed just as quickly. In homes where children grew up with Dutch friends and the city naturally became their home. Not in a visible neighborhood like elsewhere in the country (the so-called Moluccan neighborhoods), but as a community spread out, present in life stories rather than street names.

The first generation has now largely disappeared. The residential camps have been demolished or repurposed. The ships that docked in 1951 are out of service. But the Moluccans are still here. For 75 years, part of the melting pot of the city.

Netherlands and the Moluccas

The bond between the Moluccans and the Netherlands is more than 75 years old. The Moluccas were in fact one of the first Indonesian islands colonized by the Netherlands. This happened through violence.

For example, the local population of Banda Island was largely massacred and driven out in 1621 by the VOC under the leadership of Jan Pieterszoon Coen to gain a monopoly on the trade in nutmeg and mace. The production of these spices was more valuable to Coen and the VOC than human lives.

After the VOC was dissolved, the occupied areas came under the control of the Dutch state. This is how the colony of the Dutch East Indies was formed.

Image: Stadsarchief Amsterdam

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