Rapid liberation, lengthy wait

They were scouts with light, high-speed armoured vehicles. The following days were hectic. Thousands of soldiers passed through. Hundreds were billeted in schools and homes where the Allied troops could rest from the fighting or provide logistical support for the front. 

On the night of 14 to 15 July 1944, the Germans captured eight members of the Resistance. The families of the eight men remained in dreadful uncertainty for a long time. Marcel Heselmans never returned home. He was shot dead during an escape attempt. Marcel Coenen died on 18 March 1945 in the concentration camp in Berga-aan-de-Elster (Buchenwald). His remains were buried in a mass grave. Coenen and Heselmans were the leaders of section 94 of the Group G Resistance group. They helped British pilots to hide and broke into municipal offices to falsify documents and so hinder deportations and confiscations of food.

The other six, together with hundreds of other Belgian prisoners, were taken from Breendonk, via Buchenwald, to Dora-Blankenburg in Germany. The Belgian prisoners included Louis Boeckmans from Tessenderlo. The Red Cross brought him, together with the group from Vorst, to Sweden in April 1945, where the weakened prisoners – Louis weighed less than 40 kilos – were able to recuperate. They only returned home on 13 July 1945. After the liberation, Louis moved to live in Vorst.