Fort aan den Hoek van Holland, Hook of Holland

The Fort aan den Hoek van Holland, also called Fort 1881, is a former armored fort in Hoek van Holland.

The fort, located on the New Waterway, served to protect the waterway in wartime from an enemy fleet and the beach from invasion. To this end, the fort had six cannons in three rotating armored turrets. Furthermore, a mine barrier could be placed in the fairway. Both the rotation of the turrets and the elevation of the guns were done with the use of hydraulics. This made the fortress very modern upon completion. However, with the arrival of the latest battleships, whose artillery had a longer range than the fort, by 1900 it was already obsolete. There was no money for large-scale improvements and so the situation remained largely the same until World War II.

At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the Netherlands remained neutral. However, there was a general mobilization and the fort was ready for combat to defend neutrality. When World War II broke out, general mobilization was again announced. After the German invasion in 1940 fighting took place around the fortress. After the Netherlands capitulated, the Germans took over the fortress. The turrets and artillery and other metal were removed from the fortress in 1943 and melted down for use in German industry. After the war, the fort came into the hands of the Royal Navy who used it as a storage facility. The fort stood empty from 1978 until it was handed over to the Fort aan den Hoek van Holland Foundation in 1987, which converted it into a museum. In 1995 the fort received replicas of the turrets; however, of sprayed concrete instead of the original cast iron.