Albert's trip to Belgium

Today’s speaker was Jean Wrathall, whose talk was called Albert's trip to Belgium. Jean is treasurer of the Liberal Club, she said she came to live in Meltham when she was 10 months old, so as she said is still a come a innerer. The Albert in the title is her Father who was in the army during World war 11 and was evacuated from Dunkirk in 1940 and was then part of the D-Day landings that liberated Europe from Nazi occupation in 1944.

Albert always wanted to go back to the beaches of France and to the town of La Louviere in Belgium where he ended up and made friends with some of the grateful inhabitants. Albert also took part in football match between La Louviere and the British army which is remembered in the Golden book of la Louviere. So along with Jean's brother Paul they set of on the Euro Star on a weeks adventure retracing Alberts experiences during the war. They stayed in the beautiful city of Bruges before ending up visiting the Menin gate in Ypres where they shut the gate at 8 O’clock every night then a priest says prayers and the last post is played before the gate is reopened.

In La Louviere Albert meet up with a family he had kept in contact with for years, before heading back home.

Jean ended her talk by reading a very moving poem from WW1.