DACC

From Sliedrecht to VolkerWessels: the Dutch companies behind Australian Dredging and General Works

Australian Dredging and General Works was established in 1950 through the cooperation of two longstanding Dutch civil-engineering companies: Adriaan Volker’s Maatschappij tot het Uitvoeren van Openbare Werken and Van Hattum & Blankevoort. Both businesses had grown from nineteenth-century contracting enterprises into internationally active engineering organisations. Their Australian joint venture combined Read more

By DACC, ago

Australian Dredging and General Works (1950–2011): Dutch engineering in post-war Australia

Australian Dredging and General Works Pty Ltd was established in 1950 to bring Dutch dredging expertise, equipment and skilled personnel to Australia. Initially based in Williamstown, Victoria, the company was an Australian subsidiary jointly associated with two established Dutch civil-engineering businesses: Adriaan Volker’s Maatschappij tot het Uitvoeren van Openbare Werken Read more

By DACC, ago

Contemporary newspaper reports on the Sliedrecht–Williamstown dredging migration, 1950–1954

This page brings together contemporary Australian and Dutch newspaper reports relating to the Dutch dredging workers and their families who travelled to Australia in 1950. The reports document the formation of Australian Dredging and General Works, the recruitment of skilled Dutch workers, the transport of dredging vessels and equipment to Read more

By DACC, ago

Dutch military and civil organisations in Australia after the fall of the Netherlands East Indies, March–April 1942

The Japanese conquest of the Netherlands East Indies in early 1942 brought a sudden and initially uncoordinated movement of Dutch and Indonesian military personnel, government officials, merchant seamen, civilian aircrew and refugees to Australia. Most members of the Royal Netherlands East Indies Army—the KNIL—were captured when Java surrendered. Nevertheless, a Read more

By DACC, ago