Erik Müller

Since when have you been actively involved with orders of chivalry and honours?
I started collecting in 1995.

What is the reason or motivation behind your interest in orders of chivalry and honours?
I have always been very interested in history, particularly that of the First and Second World Wars. When my grandmother fell ill and began sorting through her belongings, I came across my great-grandfather’s 1914–1918 Mobilisation Commemorative Cross. That really piqued my interest: I wanted to know what sort of honour it was and why he had been awarded it. Just as with Willem de Boer, the book *Collecting is also an art*, which includes a story about Henny Meijer and his collection, has been an important source of inspiration for me. The same goes for Dr Bax’s book on Dutch orders of chivalry and decorations.
Through the holiday and temporary work I did with the police, I came into contact with Theo Kalf, curator of the Police Museum; he provided me with a great deal of information. When I first started collecting, I could find very little literature on the subject. That is why I launched *The Dutch Medals Page* in 1998. This later became www.onderscheidingen.nl. I handed this over to Stichting KROON in March 2026.

What is your area of interest?
I collect honours awarded by the emergency services (police, fire service, Red Cross, rescue services) and municipal honours. In my research, I focus on the question of who received an honour, why, and for what purpose. I limit my research to Dutch nationals, foreign honours awarded to Dutch nationals, and Dutch honours awarded to foreign nationals.

Do you hold any knighthoods or honours yourself?
I was made a Knight in the Order of Orange-Nassau in 2023 and received the Silver Medal of Merit of the Dutch Cross in 2022. I also hold various official and unofficial Dutch and foreign honours.

What is your favourite decoration and why?
I don’t really have one favourite decoration, but I do have a number of favourite background stories about certain groups of decorations. At the moment, my focus is on the group of decorations awarded to Mr Jacob Lodewijk Bakhuysen Schuld. This lawyer and public prosecutor was a reserve officer alongside his professional work and, during the interwar period, was involved in various organisations that brought children from Eastern Europe to the Netherlands to help them recover here following the First World War and the Russian Revolution. For this work, he received various foreign Red Cross awards. Following the May Days of 1940, he became involved in counter-espionage. In 1941, he was arrested by the Germans and sentenced to life imprisonment. Via the Oranjehotel and Camp Amersfoort, he ended up in Dachau. He was liberated there in 1945, but was too weak to return to the Netherlands. He died there in an American field hospital in August 1945. There were various controversies surrounding him, and research into his life is bringing to light interesting information that warrants further investigation.

Which order of knighthood or honour would you yourself like to receive one day?
I would love to receive the Cross of Merit from the Dutch Red Cross one day. I have been active as a volunteer in various roles within the Red Cross for many years. I also think it is a very fine honour.

Who do you think deserves a royal honour?
If I think someone deserves a royal honour, I nominate them. I do this about six or seven times a year. I would therefore like to answer the question differently, namely by saying who, in my opinion, does not deserve a royal honour. Despite the reform of the system that came into force in 1996, there are still automatic mechanisms within the system. When the House of Representatives bid farewell to various MPs after the elections, all MPs who had served their full term were awarded the title of Knight in the Order of Orange-Nassau, including those who were only present at the swearing-in and farewell ceremonies and had never actually sat in the House in between. In my view, this detracted from the value of my own honour. I would therefore like to call for the abolition of the automatic award of honours to political office-holders.

Which Dutch researcher, collector or stakeholder would you like to pass the baton to?
Laurens Stroek: I believe that it is not only the established names who should be featured, but also the younger talent.

Name Erik Müller
Place of birth Hoorn
Year of birth 1979
Occupation: Information specialist in the public sector
Contact address erikhmuller@hotmail.com