Ministère des Travaux publics et de la Reconstruction, Administration Dommages de Guerre / Ministerie van Transport en Infrastructuur, Dienst Oorlogsschade

On 15 August 1917, the Ministry of Justice created the War Damage Service. This department had to group, compile and examine bundles of war damage complaints according to the compensation to which the victims were entitled. It also prepared the legislation concerning the assessment, estimation and repair of the destruction.

During World War II, significant damage was inflicted on private property, for which compensation could be sought afterward. The National Archives preserves hundreds of thousands of such 'war damage files'. These files contain a wealth of unique and diversified information that undoubtedly can be valuable to numerous researchers - both specialists and the general public alike.

Between 1940 and 1945, a total of 506,090 properties - approximately 23.3% of the buildings that existed before the war - were damaged or destroyed. This included 16,803 industrial and commercial buildings, 31,253 farms, and numerous private homes. No province was spared.

In hopes of obtaining compensation, property owners meticulously listed and described their damaged goods from World War II, including purchase receipts, certificates, floor plans, postcards, and photographs. Although in black and white and often completely yellowed, these visual testimonies provide a clear picture of the extent of the "collateral damage" of the war.

Today, the National Archives holds around 800,000 of such individual 'war damage files'. These documents depict the condition of built and unbuilt real estate, industrial and commercial equipment, and agricultural land across the country. For every province, city, and village, one can reconstruct the appearance of that time street by street. The inventory of damage to real and personal property also includes many details about lost furniture, bedding, tableware, foodstuffs, and family souvenirs.

These archives offer new perspectives for studying socio-economic and rural history, military history, ecological history, public health history, family and mental history, as well as local history and genealogy. In short, the individual files on war damage to private property during World War II are an invaluable source for 20th-century historiography, with research potential extending far beyond the history of the Second World War itself.

Related archives include those of the Central Planning Board, records related to war damage from the First World War, records of the Emission Bank, records of damage to goods of settlers in Congo, and records of the Society for Credit to Small Business and Industry. These archives provide a wealth of information about the period surrounding the independence of Congo (1960).

The war damage files and related archives were stored for years in extremely poor material conditions in a warehouse of the Federal Ministry of the Interior in Pasteurstraat in Anderlecht. To prevent the destruction of these valuable files, the National Archives team intervened and completed the second phase of the relocation operation in 2012, concluding it in the summer of 2015.

In 2012, the National Archives published the scientific study "Debris and Reconstruction," focusing on the various research avenues provided by the war damage files and related archives, for diverse disciplines. The study aims to encourage readers to discover and exploit the possibilities of this treasure trove of information.