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Lordship of Bredevoort

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County of Lohn

The former Lordship of Bredevoort was originally part of the County of Lohn, which likely originated in the 11th century. In 1152, this county included the parishes of Lohn, Winterswijk, Aalten, Varsseveld, Zelhem, and Hengelo (G). In their pursuit of independence, the Counts of Lohn came into conflict with the Bishop of Münster, whose suzerainty they eventually had to recognize in 1152. In 1246, half of the Bredevoort Castle was owned by Count Herman of Lohn, who in that year granted his share as a fief to Count Otto of Guelders.

Upon the death of the last Count of Lohn in 1316, his territory disintegrated. The parishes of Varsseveld and Silvolde went to the Lord of Wisch; the parishes of Zelhem and Hengelo had already been sold to Guelders. In 1316, the Bishop of Münster purchased half of Bredevoort Castle, along with its share of Lohnish rights, from Otto van Ahaus, one of the heirs. The other half of the castle had already been in episcopal possession since 1284.

County of Guelders

This purchase led to a dispute between Münster and Guelders, resulting in a war in 1324. Count Reinald of Guelders invaded the Bishopric of Münster and was defeated at Coesfeld, though he had already conquered Bredevoort. At the peace treaty concluded in Wesel in 1326, Reinald retained Bredevoort and received the jurisdictions of the surrounding parishes of Aalten, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk as a pledge. The Bishop of Münster was entitled to redeem this pledge at any time for 3,500 gold marks, which, however, never occurred. From 1326 onwards, the area became an independent territory administered by a ducal official.

Gemen and Steinfurt Pledge (1388-1526)

In 1388, William of Jülich, as Duke of Guelders, pledged his castle, town, and the District of Bredevoort with its three parishes to Lord Henry III of Gemen in exchange for a substantial loan. Successive generations of this family remained pledge-holders of the lordship until 1492, when the pledge passed to his heirs and subsequently to the Counts of Bentheim-Steinfurt. It was not until 1526 that Duke Charles of Guelders redeemed the pledge and took the lordship back under his own administration. In 1534, he entrusted Bredevoort to his commander Marten van Rossum, who received the lordship as a pledge in 1545 from Emperor Charles V, the legal successor to the Dukes of Guelders.

Anholt Pledge (1562-1612)

When Van Rossum died in 1555, the pledge passed via Johan van Isendoorn to Hendrik van Isendoorn à Blois, who received the pledge sum back in 1562. King Philip II of Spain, acting as Duke of Guelders, then pledged the lordship for 50,000 Flemish shields to his vassal Dietrich van Bronckhorst-Batenburg. He was the Lord of neighboring Anholt in Westphalia, who already possessed many properties and rights within the Lordship of Bredevoort.

After the Reformation, the Lords of Anholt remained Roman Catholic and aligned with the Spanish side. Consequently, Bredevoort was besieged and conquered by Prince Maurice of Nassau in 1597. Lady Gertrud von Milendonck, the widow of Jacob van Bronckhorst-Batenburg, had the lordship returned to her by the Republic in 1602. However, the pledge was redeemed by the States of Gelderland in 1612 and subsequently taken over by Prince Maurice.

Many archival documents concerning the period 1526-1612 are located in the Bredevoort Collection within the Fürstlich Salm-Salmsches Archiv at the Wasserburg Anholt near Isselburg (D). Older documents from before 1562 were likely transferred to their house archive at the time by order of the Anholt pledge-holders as evidence of their rights. After the termination of the

Pledge City of the House of Orange

In 1697, Bredevoort was granted as a free lordship to King-Stadtholder William III, whose heirs possessed it until 1795.

In 1986, the 1726 regulations for the gatekeepers in Bredevoort were received from the National Archives in Friesland, part of the Fries Genootschap collection.

In the house archive of the former inn De Leste Stuver in Bredevoort, held in Aalten, there is an almanac used by the Stadtholder or the Land Scribe as a pocket diary during the period 1737/38.

In 1646, the castle at Bredevoort was destroyed due to a lightning strike on the gunpowder tower. It took over 50 years before new housing was realized. In 1699, a new chancery, the Ambthuis, was built on Landstraat in Bredevoort.

District of Bredevoort (1795-1811)

After the Batavian Revolution in 1795, the possessions of the House of Orange were declared forfeit; the Lordship of Bredevoort was placed under civil administration. In 1798, the lordships were officially abolished. The former municipalities of Aalten, Bredevoort, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk were established in 1795 and abolished in 1798. Following the abolition of the lordships in 1798, the former municipality of Lichtenvoorde was added to the District of Bredevoort and separated from it again in 1802.

In 1994, Dr. G.J.H. Krosenbrink of Winterswijk donated a report concerning the administrative organization of the old District, prepared for the new District administration in the period 1798-1802, originating from the then-district board member H. Willink Azn. of Winterswijk.

The District of Bredevoort remained in existence as an administrative unit until the French occupation. In the years 1811 and 1812, it was divided into the Mairies of Aalten, Bredevoort, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk.

The archive of the District was kept at the chancery, the Ambthuis in Bredevoort. In 1795, it was seized and inventoried by order of the Provisional Government, after which it was placed under the management of the secretary of the Municipality of Aalten. After the French occupation, during the restoration of Dutch administration, documents were removed from the archive and transferred to the new municipalities of Aalten, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk. The former steward J.B. Roelvink of the Nassau Domains also retained the chancery archive, which was unfortunately destroyed by a legal successor in 1985.

Administration

Bredevoort was originally a small ‘borgman’ town based on the Westphalian model. The noble defenders of the castle lived in fortified houses on the outer bailey, which consequently took on the character of a fortress. In the neighboring Bishopric of Münster, such ‘borgmannen’ exercised authority and jurisdiction over their staff and the serf inhabitants of the castle complexes they managed in Horstmar and Nienborg.

Upon the transfer of Bredevoort in 1326, the Bishop of Münster released his Bredevoort ‘borgmannen’ from their oath so they could enter Guelders’ service. In 1503, the Bredevoort ‘borgmannen’ obtained similar privileges from the then-pledge-holder, Everwijn van Steinfurt. However, no city rights for Bredevoort have survived. The military and administrative role of the ‘borgmannen’ ended after the defense was entrusted to a garrison during the 16th century.

The daily administration of the Lordship of Bredevoort rested with the Drost (Bailiff). Following the Münster occupation during the war years 1672-1674, a separate urban administration of a stadtholder and regents of the city of Bredevoort existed briefly within the walls. The Drost often also served as the Richter (Judge). Jurisdiction was provided by the Richter with two ‘keurnoten’ (assessors). The court was held once every two weeks in Aalten, Bredevoort, and Winterswijk. Court days for Dinxperlo were held in Aalten.

Jurisdiction in the city of Bredevoort was exercised by the Richter of the lordship with two ‘keurnoten’, as in the other parishes. Other officials at the court were the Land Scribe (secretary) and the Advocate-Fiscal (public prosecutor). The Land Scribe also served as the secretary to the Drost. Since the latter usually did not reside in the lordship, the Land Scribe often also acted as his deputy as acting-Drost or Stadtholder. Bredevoort had a fortress commander, the “Commandeur der Forteresse”. This position was often combined with that of acting-Drost in a single person. Furthermore, there was a whole series of lower officials, including a gauger, a tool sharpener, a surveyor, and armenjagers (rural constables).

Due to the fact that members of the noble Van Pallandt family and the related families of Van Lintelo and Van Coeverden held the position of Drost of Bredevoort for a long time, a large number of documents concerning Bredevoort matters from the period 1638-1796 are also found in the archive of House Keppel, likewise held at the Gelders Archief in Arnhem.

The last Drost of the District of Bredevoort, since the Batavian Revolution in 1795, was the Winterswijk citizen W. Paschen Gzn. of Winterswijk. His accounts for the period August 1808 – March 1811 were audited and deposited in Winterswijk on September 4, 1812, by the joint mayors of Aalten, Bredevoort, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk. As early as 1811, Paschen, as temporary mayor of Winterswijk, requested the former Land Scribe to transfer documents concerning Winterswijk matters. According to a letter in the archive of the Municipality of Winterswijk, a chest of archival records was transported by wheelbarrow from Aalten to Winterswijk in 1813. The selection process at the time was somewhat arbitrary, so other Bredevoort documents also ended up in Winterswijk. Steward J.B. Roelvink also transferred Bredevoort documents to the Mayor of Winterswijk in 1815. Incidentally, Lichtenvoorde was only part of the District during the years 1798-1802.

Since 1612, officials were appointed by the Nassau Domain Council. For appointment data, see the so-called ‘Ambtboek’, held in the archive of the aforementioned Domain Council at the National Archives in The Hague. Information on appointments in the District of Bredevoort can also be found in the archive of the Drost and Geërfden, inv. nos. 22-33, and in the archival collection Local Government Winterswijk, inv. no. 14. Through the Drosten, many personnel records also ended up in the Keppel house archive, held at the Gelders Archief in Arnhem.

Besides the city of Bredevoort, the lordship consisted of three judicial districts, which coincided with the three parishes of Aalten, Dinxperlo, and Winterswijk. In each parish, a ‘voogd’ (warden) and one or two ‘ondervoogden’ (sub-wardens) were appointed, acting as intermediaries between the inhabitants of the parishes and the administration in Bredevoort. Each parish consisted of a village and a number of rural districts, called guilds, which were divided into wards. These were headed by ward and guild masters, who were responsible for the further dissemination of messages and the execution of orders. Additionally, each rural district had a messenger, an office tied to a specific farm.

Financial matters were handled per parish by the local ‘geërfden’ (landed stakeholders). These representatives of the population were delegated per village and rural district and were accountable to the Drost. The town of Bredevoort had its own Steward, who acted on behalf of the local ‘geërfden’. Each parish had its own collector of the ‘verponding’ (land tax). In Bredevoort, the ward masters sometimes acted collectively as collectors of the ‘verponding’. The churchwardens in each parish, responsible for managing the capital and property of the local church, were elected from the ‘geërfden’ and had to provide accounts to the Drost and their fellow ‘geërfden’. Alongside the ‘diaconie’ as a church institution, there was also a secular institution for poor relief, the ‘provisorie’. Like the churchwardens, ‘provisoren’ were elected from the ‘geërfden’ and were required to account for their management in the same manner.

Sources

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