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This badly burned and twisted insignia is the 4th Class Military William Order of Captain Jan Carel Josephus van Speijk, the highest Dutch military decoration.

During the Belgian Revolution in 1831, Van Speijk deliberately blew up his own gunboat rather than let it fall into Belgian hands. His decoration was later recovered from the River Scheldt, still attached to the remains of his uniform.

To collectors, this damaged cross has virtually no value.

To historians, it is one of the most remarkable surviving Dutch decorations.

Van Speijk is remembered very differently depending on where you ask. In the Netherlands he became a national hero. In Belgium, many would call him a terrorist.

Whatever your perspective, this insignia is an extraordinary witness to history.

Most medals from the Napoleonic Wars were instituted by monarchs. This one wasn't.

The Brussels Medal of 1815 was created by the city of Brussels to reward members of the city's civic guard for helping defend Brussels against the French in 1815.

One detail I particularly like is that the medal wasn't originally meant to be worn. Only in 1818 did King William I authorize recipients to wear it on a green–orange–green ribbon.

It's a small detail, but it gives the medal an unusual history compared with most military awards of the period.

Are there other city-issued military decorations from the Napoleonic era that you think deserve more attention?

I thought some of you might enjoy this one.

Most Military William Orders you come across are Knight 4th Class. The 3rd Class is seen far less often, which makes it especially interesting to collectors.

What really caught my eye, is the craftsmanship. The gold work, the enamel and the overall quality remind you that these weren't just decorations... they were pieces of fine jewellery made to honour extraordinary bravery.

Does anyone here collect Military William Order pieces, or have you ever come across one with a documented recipient?

I've always liked the simplicity of the Dutch Silver Cross 1813–1815.

It wasn't awarded immediately after the Napoleonic Wars. Instead, King William I instituted it in 1865 to honour the surviving veterans who had fought during the campaigns of 1813–1815, including Quatre Bras and Waterloo.

By then, many recipients were elderly men looking back on events that had taken place half a century earlier. That makes this decoration feel a little different from most campaign medals...it wasn't simply recognition of a campaign, but recognition of a lifetime.

I think that's part of what gives the Silver Cross its appeal. Every surviving example once belonged to someone who witnessed the final years of the Napoleonic Wars.

What's your favourite veteran's medal that was instituted decades after the conflict itself?

Here’s the Dutch Atjeh Medal, instituted in 1874 for participants in the expeditions to Atjeh in 1873–1874.

One detail I love: these medals were struck from cannon captured in Atjeh. It was first worn on an orange ribbon, but in 1875 that was changed to blue. It’s also known as the Kraton Medal, after the captured palace.

A small medal, but loaded with colonial history.

Do you prefer these early campaign medals on their original ribbon type, or the later official one?

G.W. Locher arrived on Timor in 1940 as an anthropologist, not a soldier. Everything changed after the Japanese invasion in February 1942. With the island overrun, he escaped into the mountains, joining a small group that survived for months on the run with little food, no resupply, and no certainty of rescue.

When the group split, one party was killed. Locher's group eventually reached the coast and was evacuated to Australia by a Dutch destroyer in December 1942. He later insisted his survival was due to luck rather than heroism.

For his service, he received the Dutch Cross for Military Operations with the TIMOR 1942 clasp—a reminder of one of the less-known Dutch campaigns of the Pacific War.

Which overlooked WWII campaign do you think deserves far more attention from military historians?

At first glance, this looks like a standard Dutch Bronze Cross, instituted on 11 June 1940 by Queen Wilhelmina in London. It was awarded for acts of courage or distinguished leadership in the face of the enemy.

The detail that makes this example extraordinary is the gold numeral "3" on the ribbon.

That numeral doesn't indicate a class or grade—it signifies that the recipient earned the Bronze Cross three separate times for qualifying acts of gallantry. Multiple awards were recognized by adding a gold Arabic numeral to the ribbon rather than issuing another cross.

Examples with the numeral 3 are scarce. Collector research generally identifies only a few wartime recipients, all Royal Netherlands Navy officers, making original groups with this device highly sought after. As always, provenance is crucial, since an unattached ribbon device is difficult to authenticate.

For collectors of Dutch gallantry awards, it's a great reminder that sometimes the rarest part of a medal isn't the cross itself—it's a tiny piece of metal on the ribbon.

Which ribbon device or clasp do you think is the most underrated rarity in military medal collecting?