Ten Bossche, in Latin apud buscum, was originally a wooded area across the Woluwe from Nijpezele. A manor stood there, the Hof ten Bossche, a fief of the lordship of Wezembeek, at the start of the present Pachthofstraat, where the railway underpass to the industrial zone now runs. The water mill on the Hollebeek beside it was called the molen ten Bossche, and the bridge over the Woluwe the Boschbrugge.
The manor changed hands often: in 1429 Margaretha vanden Berghe, in 1543 François vander Stock, around 1606 Gillis de Smet, later the Spira family and in 1674 Jan vander Beken. Later maps call it the Domijn farm. In 1835 it belonged to the widow of Jacques Anneet. Around 1908 it was called ‘Les Buissons’; in 1933 it was demolished to build the Woluwelaan.
The mill of the Steenvoort beguines
The molen ten Bossche lay a little further on, on the Hollebeek. From the 13th to the mid-15th century it probably belonged to the beguinage of Steenvoort, founded in 1239 on the boundary with Vilvoorde and pulled down in 1578 so that the town could be better defended. The sources therefore call it ‘the mill of the beguines of Steenvoort at Nijpezele’. Private owners followed, such as Jan de Vaddere (1457), and in 1677 Adam de Smet was the miller.
The Jacobs mill
A little downstream of the Duivenmolen stood another mill, belonging to the Jacobs family of Brussels, mentioned in 1607 and 1626. The paper maker Foppens ran it together with his own paper mill as a single business, and in 1726 it passed to Pieter Jan Bauwens. Members of the Jacobs family remained active in Diegem as paper makers and oil millers. On 7 October 1783 the supplier of oil and candles to the imperial troops asked for a fine on Jacobs to be cancelled: his oil mill had run on a Sunday, but this was necessary to keep the garrisons supplied with light.
The Broekmolen or Brachmolen
The Broekmolen stood beside the Langbroek. It was first a corn mill and became a paper mill in the 15th century. It already existed in 1370: in his will of that year Wouter van Diedeghem asked to be buried in the abbey of Kortenberg, and he left annuities to that abbey and to the Minor Canons of St Gudula in Brussels, who jointly owned the Broekmolen. In 1611 they handed it over to Lancelot de Pretere. The mill was then in ruins and was rebuilt in 1624.
In 1625 and 1669 the sources speak of a powder mill. In 1636 the owner Johan Jourdain, secretary of the Council of Brabant, was allowed to convert the paper and oil mill. Around 1900 August Mommaerts, brother of Judocus of the Duivenmolen, was still pressing oil there. Then came a tannery and fur works, which was expropriated around 1930 when the Woluwe was covered over.