Cowan. Greig, Louisa and Yvonne Deloge and friends Brussels 1941

Alfred JONES had been existing in Brussels helped by Marie DARMONT-COLLET, the DELOGE's and many of their friends. Soon he was again in immanent danger of re-capture so had gone back to hide outside Brussels with the D'HAESELEER family, mother, father, daughter seventeen year old Elsa and fourteen year old son. Alfred stayed there for about three months. The family didn't help in the underground movement but gave Alfred food and shelter because they belonged to the village where he had originally escaped.
Joseph De Backer had taken Joseph Dixey and Jimmy Clark to the house of the Gillard family. the Gillards were arrested on the 18th May 1941 while the British soldiers hid in the cellar.

AUGUST 1941

On the 6th August the British soldiers Louis Green and Thomas Taylor were arrested at the house of a man called van Lesucourt, another man Carlo De Groot was also arrested and photographs of Louis Green dressed up as Hitler were found. On the 14 August Corporal Enoch BETTLEY and Private Samuel SLAVIN were recaptured at the house of Madam Augusta MARIOUX and her daughter in Rue Bogier, Scharbeek and taken to St.Gilles prison. They were kept there for sixteen days, interrogated and beaten daily. They were then sent to POW Camp in Germany. The D'Looge family in Paricke were surprised to receive a letter from them from the camp some time later. On the same day the GFP raided Marie Le Gal's house in the rue Alsembourg and found RAF Polish pilot Szczepan Scibior. Slavin, Bettley and Scibior were all suspected of espionage and an investigation took place

SEPTEMBER 1941

Marie DARMONT-COLLET and her son Jean DARMONT were arrested on the 3rd September. Francois STRENS and Elise AUSSELOOS on the ninth of September.
On the 13th September  Louisa DELOGE was arrested and taken to the Geheime Feldpolizei (Germany's 'plain clothes' military police) building in the Rue Traversiere in Brussels. On the same day or two days later her sister Yvonne was arrested and also taken to the Rue Traversiere.

On the 25th September 1941 the Geheime Feldpolizei raided the house of Madame Duchenne at Rue Sans-Souci Ixelles where McCUBBIN was staying. He tried to get away but as he ran out of the house he was held by a passer-by who thought he was a thief and shot three times by the persuing Germans, fell and fractured his shoulder. Madame Duchene and her daughter Florence were arrested and taken to St. Gilles prison. McCubbin was taken to the Belgian Military Hospital and then the St.Pierre Hospital and later also to St.Gilles Prison.
Bobby Conville and Allan Cowan were on their way to Rue Sans-Souci from having their passport photos taken at the Bon Marche where Yvonne Deloge worked. As they arrived at the street, neighbours warned them what had happened to their colleague and they were able to get away

On the 28th September or the 1st October a red headed English or Irish infiltrator was spotted outside VANDENHOVE's house in Rue ********** where LANGLOIS COPLEY and the Scottish soldier AHEARN were hiding. On the morning of the next day there was a terrific thumping on the door, the men looked out and saw three cars, the Geheime Feldpolizei were raiding the house.The evaders leaned out from the 3rd floor right window to see German soldiers lining the street and heard them attacking the front door with rifle butts. The outer door was strongly built, it took quite an effort for the Germans to break through and gave them time to make their escape. As the door was smashed in LANGLOIS, COPLEY and AHEARN grabbed their clothes and rushed down to the basement. Vandenhove had built a tunnel from the kitchen to the main sewer in the street. Two days previously he had checked that the exit from the sewer through a manhole in the street was free but when the three evaders tried to lift the manhole they were unable to move it. They were forced to stay in the sewer. Meanwhile back in the house Vandenhove had already been arrested, their hiding place was given away by the family dog they had befriended. The Germans shot the dog and the airmen and soldier were trapped in the sewer for seven hours before they had to return to the kitchen and give themselves up.

OCTOBER 1941

On 3rd October 1941 Marceline DELOGE left her home in Rue General Capiaumont and went to enquire with the German authorities about the whereabouts of her two missing daughters. She was arrested at the Rue Traversiere GFP HQ, held for questioning and then taken to the main Brussels' prison of St Gilles where her daughters were already being held.
The arrests continued Alice de WERGIFOSSE on the fifteenth of October,Professor Jean-Marie Derscheid at sometime in October, Welsh Corporal Alfred JONES was taken while playing cards on the twenty-eighth.

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© John Clinch 2002