Half model of a floating 32-gun artillery battery

Rijkswerf Willemsoord, 1861

The Royal Netherlands Navy converted wooden ships of the line into floating batteries, hoping to give these expensive vessels a second lease of life as artillery plat-forms for the defence of Dutch river estuaries and inland waterways. This model represents the battery Neptunus, which was fitted with 32 guns. The Neptunus was origi-nally built as a ship of the line with the same name.

  • Artwork typescale model, construction model
  • Object numberNG-MC-1121
  • Dimensionsheight 28.4 cm x width 130.2 cm x depth 24 cm
  • Physical characteristicswood and brass

Rijkswerf Willemsoord

Model of a 32-Gun Floating Battery

Den Helder, Den Helder, 1861

Inscriptions

  • inscription, amidships, on the stem and stern, three times:LAST / LEDIG
  • inscription, on the base, left:Drijvende Batterij / NEPTUNUS.
  • inscription, on the base, right:Voornaamste afmetingen / [followed by measurements]

Provenance

...; transferred from the Ministerie van Marine (Department of the Navy), The Hague, to the museum, 1883

Object number: NG-MC-1121

Entry

Longitudinal cross section of a floating battery showing one half only, mounted on a rectangular base. The fore of the battery is not planked and has no ceiling, showing all the floor timbers and frames. Three decks, eleven gun ports in the side for the main deck, one and a half gun ports for the main and upper deck fore and aft are indicated. The sheer of the original ship is clearly noticeable. The model is placed on keel blocks, which correspond to the frame numbers in the drawings.

The 32-gun floating battery Neptunus, represented by this model, was cut down from 1858 to 1860 from the 84-gun ship Neptunus (57.80 metres long, built by Cornelis Soetermeer (1782-1842) in Flushing from 1821 to 1835 and the last three-decker of the Dutch Navy; renamed Koning der Nederlanden in 1844 and decommissioned in 1876).1A.J. Vermeulen, De schepen van de Koninklijke Marine en die der gouvernementsmarine 1814-1962, The Hague 1962, p. 3. It was the first Dutch ship to be converted to a floating battery by Lambertus Katharinus Turk (1811-1873), after which it was renamed Neptunus. Comparison with drawings and archival material suggests that this model represents the changes proposed by P.A. Bruijn in September 1861.

Scale (on model) 1:50.

Literature

L.K. Turk, ‘Over het veranderen van een linieschip van 84 stukken tot drijvende batterij’, Mededeelingen betrekkelijk het zeewezen (1861), no. 2, pp. 1-12; B.J. Tideman, Memoriaal van de Marine, bevattende opgaven betrekkelijk de afmetingen, constructie, ... van Nederlandsche oorlogsschepen en omtrent enige havens, dokken, sluizen, werven enz., Amsterdam 1876-80, vol. 2, p. 8; J.M. Obreen et al., handwritten inventory list for items 944 to 1431, 1884, manuscript in HNA 476 RMA, inv. no. 1089, no. 1121; A.J. Vermeulen, De schepen van de Koninklijke Marine en die der gouvernementsmarine 1814-1962, The Hague 1962, p. 3; A. van Dijk, Voor Pampus. De ontwikkeling van de scheepsbouw bij de Koninklijke Marine omstreeks 1860, Amsterdam/The Hague 1987 (Bijdragen tot de Nederlandse Marinegeschiedenis, vol. 4), pp. 55 ff.; A.J. Hoving, Message in a Model: Stories from the Navy Model Room of the Rijksmuseum, Florence, OR 2013, pp. 142-45

Citation

J. van der Vliet, 2016, 'Rijkswerf Willemsoord, Model of a 32-Gun Floating Battery, Den Helder, 1861', in J. van der Vliet and A. Lemmers (eds.), Navy Models in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200316073

(accessed 16 December 2025 18:12:09).

Footnotes

  • 1A.J. Vermeulen, De schepen van de Koninklijke Marine en die der gouvernementsmarine 1814-1962, The Hague 1962, p. 3.