Willem Jan Knoop

Who was Willem Jan Knoop?

Willem Jan Knoop was a Dutch lieutenant-general, military historian, and politician. As a young captain of the Dutch General Staff he wrote a rebuttal of the English military historian captain William Siborne's account of the Battle of Quatre Bras and the Battle of Waterloo, published as History of the war in France and Flanders in 1815 in 1844, in which Siborne disparaged the conduct of the Dutch army at these battles. Siborne's book had caused a furore in the Netherlands as he saw fit to insult the honor of the Dutch army, and of king William II of the Netherlands, who as Prince of Orange had commanded that army at both battles, and was revered as a national hero by the Dutch. As Siborne's book is still in use as a source for Anglophone historiography of the battles, and is still the subject of controversy, Knoop's criticisms are still relevant, and play a role in this controversy.