Limburg (United Kingdom of the Netherlands)
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- This article deals with a former province in United Kingdom of the Netherlands. For the current Dutch province of Limburg, see: Limburg (Netherlands). For other uses of Limburg, see: Limburg.
Limburg was one of the provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. The province existed for the duration of the United Kingdom, from 1815 to 1839. When King William I signed the Treaty of London in 1839, the province was split into a Belgian and Dutch part.
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[edit] Geography
[edit] Territory
The territory of Limburg was the same as the combined territories of the present Dutch and Belgian provinces, with the exception of Voeren, which was a part of the province of Liége at the time. Its capital was Maastricht.
[edit] Juridical subdivisions
For legal matters, the province was subdivided into the arrondissements of Maastricht, Hasselt and Roermond.
[edit] History
[edit] Formation of the province
Following the Napoleonic Era, the great powers (United Kingdom, Prussia, theAustrian Empire, the Russian Empire and France) created a new United Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1815. A new province was formed from the former French Empire département of Meuse-Inférieure (excluding Niederkrüchten and Herzogenrath which were assigned to Prussia) and was to receive the name "Maastricht," after its capital. The first king, William I, who did not want the name of the former Duchy of Limburg to be lost, insisted that the name be changed to "Limburg." As such, the name of the new province derived from the old duchy that had existed until 1648 within the triangle of Maastricht, Liège, and Aachen.
[edit] Belgian Revolution and dissolution
When the Catholic and French-speaking Belgians split away from the mainly Calvinist, Dutch Netherlands in the Belgian Revolution of 1830, General Daine, the commander of the provincial armed forces of Limburg, situated in Maastricht, chose the side of the Belgian rebels. He left the city on 7 November 1830. He arrived at Roermond on 9 November and at Venlo on 11 November. Both cities welcomed him with open arms and sided with the rebellion. However, Maastricht was back under control by loyalist forces under the command of Colonel Dibbets.
Although most of the province, including the fortress city of Venlo (at the time Belgium's nothernmost fortress), was under Belgian control following Belgium's de facto independence after the French intervention, the city of Maastricht remained in Dutch hands.
In 1839, King William I recognised the independence of Belgium by signing the Treaty of London. As a consequence, the Belgians had to relinquish the eastern part of Limburg to the Netherlands.
