THE BELGIANSTHE BELGIANS

THE BELGIANSTHE BELGIANSTHE BELGIANSTHE BELGIANS

A View of Medieval Gent

Table of Contents Overview Map of Belgium Chapter 1 History of Ghent and Area Chapter 2 King Arthur and the City of Ghent Chapter 3 City on the Mouth of the River Chapter 4 Woolen Industry Chapter 5 The Bergundians Chapter 6 Emperor Charles V Chapter 7 Revival of Catholicism and Trade Chapter 8 City of Textiles Chapter 9 Living Conditions Chapter 10 Education in Belgium Chapter 11 The Belgium Family Chapter 12 Town of Maldegem Chapter 13 The Early Boerjan Family Chapter 14 Nathalie Schalenz (Galens) Chapter 15 Bernardus (Ben) Boerjan Chapter 16 Life Together for Nathalie and Ben Chapter 17 Homesteading in Elrose Chapter 18 Bill’s Siblings Chapter 19 Life in Elrose Chapter 20 Bill and Valerie

Source: 1. Belgium Travel Network 2. Translated from Boerjan Book,

Prepared By Urbain Boerjan, Sluiskill, Nederlands.

Overview

Our Boerjan forebears hail from places such as Oost Eeclo, Maldegem, Lembeke (which has been incorporated into Kaprijke, northeast of Eeklo), Bassevelde, plus others. The nearest market center was Ghent, and this is where the family travelled to on market days. They made this trip on foot, so it must have been within a reasonable walking distance. The Kingdom of Belgium is a democracy with a constitutional monarch. The current king, Albert II, does not govern. In fact, according to the constitution, the king can't take any official action without the approval of a minister, and his ministers are held accountable for his actions! In Belgium, the king is traditionally considered a moral leader. Belgium has a well-educated public and a very high quality of life. There is almost no illiteracy, and all citizens over the age of 18 are required to vote. The leaders of the four major religions -- Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, Judaism and Islam -- are paid by the state. About three-quarters of the people are Catholic.

The Belgians Overview — Page 2

The country encompasses 11,784 square miles and is about the size of the American state of Maryland, but its coastline stretches only forty miles. It is bordered by the North Sea, the Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg and France. Belgium has a moderate climate, and is rarely very hot or cold. There are about 10 million people in Belgium. In the north part of the country, Flanders, Dutch or Flemish is spoken. In the south, Wallonia, the predominant language is French. The capital, Brussels, is in the Flemish part of the country but is predominantly French-speaking. About 10 percent of the population speaks German. Most Belgians speak English, too. At present, there are many immigrants from North Africa and the Mediterranean in Brussels. If Belgium sounds like a melting pot for different cultures, it is no wonder. In its history, it has been ruled by Austria, France, Germany, Spain and others. Figures as diverse as Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, and Napoleon have played a part in Belgium's complex history. From the Celts to the Crusades

The name Belgium comes from a Celtic tribe, the Belgae, who settled ancient Gaul around 900 BC. In 52 BC, Julius Caesar conquered the Belgae's territory, Belgica, putting Belgium under Roman rule. As the Roman Empire went into decline, a group of Germanic tribes called the Franks began settling in what is now Belgium. In time, most of the Roman region of Gaul, including Belgium, became part of the Frankish empire. The Frankish king, Charlemagne, is sometimes regarded as the founder of the Holy Roman Empire, which lasted from 800 to 1806 and included Belgium. Sometimes the Holy Roman Emperor had no real authority; sometimes he had a lot. The Frankish empire was divided up after Charlemagne's death. His grandson, Lothair, controlled that portion of the empire that included most of Belgium. The remainder became part of France. Eventually much of Belgium split into self-ruling feudal principalities. Belgium's Godfrey of Bouillon, Duke of Lower Lorraine, was one of the leaders of the First Crusade. In 1099, he became the ruler of Jerusalem, although he refused the title of king, saying that Jesus was the only king. He was shrewd enough politically to know that turning down the title would impress his subjects and increase his power. After his death,


however, his brother became King Baldwin I. Descendents of this royal Belgian family continued to rule Jerusalem for years. The Crusades opened up European trade with the East, and Belgian merchants became wealthy. They joined artisans in communes, or free cities, and gained political rights. In 1066, the citizens of Liege, in Belgium, were granted one of the world's first charters of civil liberties. The Middle Ages and Beyond

In the late 1300s, Belgium fell under the rule of Burgundy. Although Burgundy is now part of France, at that time it was an independent kingdom. In 1477, the heir to the throne of Burgundy, Mary of Burgundy, married Maximilian of Austria, who later became the king of Germany and the Holy Roman Emperor. They had a son, Philip, who inherited Mary's kingdom after her death in a riding accident, placing Burgundy -- and Belgium -- under the rule of Austria's royal Habsburg family. Philip, called "the Handsome," later married Juana the Mad, daughter of Spain's legendary rulers Ferdinand and Isabella. Like his mother, Philip died young, leaving behind a son, King Charles I of Spain, who was also Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, and, of course, the ruler of Belgium, which was then part of the Netherlands. The next two centuries were a time of great religious upheaval, and there was much conflict between Protestants and Roman Catholics in the Netherlands. Belgians were used to self-government, but in the 1780s the Habsburg emperor Joseph II tried to centralize the government in Vienna. His opponents rejected the monarchy and declared a new United States of Belgium, but Austria soon suppressed this rebellion. The Belgians accepted Joseph's great-nephew Charles as their grand duke. A few years later Belgium was taken over by French revolutionaries. It remained under French control until 1815, when French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated by British and Prussian forces at the Battle of Waterloo in Belgium. A United Kingdom of the Netherlands was created, and Belgium, known as the Southern Netherlands, was part of this kingdom. That didn't last long, either.


Leopold I and Leopold II

Dutch King William I was unpopular in Belgium, and the people revolted. Belgian independence was declared, and Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha -- a German prince who was the uncle of Britain's Queen Victoria -- was elected to be Belgium's first king. On July 21, 1831, now Belgium's Independence Day, he took the throne as Leopold I. He was a good ruler and helped the new nation prosper. Leopold's first wife was Princess Charlotte, daughter of Britain's King George IV. She died in childbirth. The year after he ascended the throne, Leopold married Princess Louise, the daughter of France's King Louis Philippe. After Leopold's death in 1865, their eldest son became King Leopold II. Leopold II is infamous today for the cruelty of his rule over the African Congo basin, which made him very rich. His only son died in childhood, so upon his death in 1909 the throne passed to his nephew, King Albert I. The Heroism of King Albert I

Albert's wisdom as a constitutional monarch was widely respected. He promoted modern reforms in Belgium and its African colony. He also tried to modernize the Belgian army, but the parliament wouldn't cooperate, which was unfortunate for Belgium. In 1914 Germany demanded permission to send its army through Belgium to attack France. Albert courageously refused, and Germany immediately invaded and occupied Belgium. Throughout World War I, Albert and his army fought for the Allied cause. King Albert is recognized as one of the heroes of the war. A patron of the arts, Albert was also interested in mechanics, engineering and aviation. His wife Elizabeth, a Bavarian duchess, shared many of his interests. They had three children: Leopold, Charles, and Marie Jose. One of King Albert's many hobbies, mountaineering, brought his life to an early end on February 18, 1934, when he went rock climbing alone and fell to his death. Leopold III and King Baudouin

King Albert's eldest son became King Leopold III. The very next year, tragedy struck the royal family again when the new king's wife, a Swedish princess named Astrid, died in a car accident.


When World War II erupted, Germany invaded Belgium once again. Leopold tried to resist, but in the end he surrendered to the Germans and became their prisoner, which made him very unpopular in some circles. In 1941, he married a commoner, Mary Liliane Baels, to whom he later gave the title of princess. They had three children. After the defeat of the Nazis, King Leopold went into exile in Switzerland. His brother Charles served as regent. In 1950, more than half of the Belgian people voted to let Leopold resume his role as king, but his opponents continued to protest, and in 1951 he formally abdicated in favor of his eldest son, Prince Baudouin. Leopold III died in 1983. On June 30, 1960 King Baudouin proclaimed the Belgian Congo's independence. On December 15, 1960 he married Fabiola-Fernanda-Maria de las Victorias-Antonia-Adelada de Mora y Aragon, a Spanish aristocrat who had worked as a nurse. Queen Fabiola, who is still alive, speaks Spanish, French, Dutch, English, German, and Italian. She is the author of children's stories and some of her royalties go to a children's charity. She works for many causes, including improving the plight of poor women worldwide. She and Baudouin had no children. King Baudouin briefly abdicated in the 1990s rather than sign a law he disagreed with. This angered many Belgians, who felt that the king should keep his beliefs to himself. Some people hoped that he would abdicate permanently. Still, he resumed his throne, and there was great public sadness when he died of heart failure on July 31, 1993 during a vacation in Spain. Today's Royal Family

Badouin was succeeded by his brother Albert II. Albert and his wife, Queen Paola, have been married since 1959. She is from a princely Italian family, the Ruffo di Calabrias. She enjoys crafts and does humanitarian work. Albert and Paola have three children: Philippe, Astrid, and Laurent. Philippe was born in 1960, Astrid in 1962, and Laurent in 1963. (The king is also said to be the father of an illegitimate daughter named Delphine Boel, who was born in 1968. Today she is an artist and lives in England.) King Albert was the head of the Belgian Red Cross for a number of years. He works to promote the economy and is interested in environmental issues. He's also interested in sports and is honorary president of the Belgian Olympic Committee. He created a great stir in the 1990s by speaking out about scandals rocking Belgium and calling for reform of the justice system to make it more humane and effective.


Prince Philippe, Duke of Brabant, is the heir to the throne. He speaks both French and Dutch. He was a pilot in the Belgian air force, trained as a paratrooper, and became a colonel in 1989. He studied constitutional history at Trinity College, Oxford in the United Kingdom and graduated from Stanford in California as a Master of Arts in political science. Since 1992 he has received an allowance from the government of Belgium. He is the honorary president of the Belgian Foreign Trade Office. In 1999, at the age of 39, Philippe married Mathilde d'Udekem d'Acoz, a 26-year old speech therapist from an aristocratic family. When Philippe inherits the throne, Mathilde will become the country's first Belgian-born queen. Their first child, Princess Elisabeth, was born in 2001. Princess Astrid studied art history in the Netherlands, and also attended school in Switzerland and Michigan. She currently chairs the Belgian Red Cross. In 1984, she married Archduke Lorenz of Austria-Este, who is now a prince of Belgium. They have four children: Amedeo, Maria Laura, Joachim, and Luisa Maria. Prince Amadeo was born in 1986, Maria Laura in 1988, Joachim in 1991, Luisa Maria in 1995. Prince Laurent is a commander in the Belgian Navy. He promotes environmental causes and animal welfare, and encourages young musicians.

The Belgians Chapter 1 — Page 1

Chapter 1 History of Ghent and Area The market center of Ghent (Gent), Belgium was within walking distance of the villages where the various branches of the family originated. Archeological research has proved that there was human settlement in Ghent during prehistoric times. Only later, in the Roman period, did the nucleus of a city began to grow near the confluence of the two rivers Scheldt and Leie. (The Flemish name “Gent” is probably derived from the Celtic “Ganda”, which meant confluence.) It was about 630 that Ghent continued to grow when the Abbey of Saint Peter (later Abbey of Saint Bavo) was founded. Later, a second abbey was founded on the so-called “Blandijnberg”. It was around these two religious centers that a residential nucleus came into existence. This early city was important enough to create a ‘portus’ with commercial activity. Charlemagne gave it a fleet for protection against the Vikings. In both 851 and 879, the Vikings attacked and plundered the city. Shortly afterwards, the first wooden fortification was built for better protection. It stood on the spot where the impressive “Castle of the Counts” can now be visited. The photo below is of Julie Ordog on the ramparts of the Castle of the Counts during the family visit to Belgium in 1998. From the 11th until the 12th century, Ghent rose to become an important trade center, principally because of the production of cloth based on the import of English wool. In 1178, Count Philip of Alsace granted Ghent its first privileges. The same Count also transformed the wooden fortification into the impressive stone Castle of the Counts. In the 13th century, the city was governed by an oligarchy of patricians who continuously defended their own mercantile interests against the Count and the corporations. During the Hundred Years' War, the Count of Flanders chose the side of the French king. Ghent, however, depended heavily on imports of English wool. Therefore, the people of Ghent asked Jacob


van Artevelde, a corporation frontman, to try and preserve trade-relations with England. Through diplomatic actions, he succeeded and managed to avoid an open conflict with the French King. Jacob was killed by his own people in 1345, but his son Fillip van Artevelde continued the opposition against the Count of Flanders, Lodewijk van Male. In the 15th century, Ghent was under the strict rule of the Dukes of Burgundy (who had obtained the County of Flanders through marriage). The city managed to regain its important privileges under Mary, the young Duchess of Burgundy. Her marriage with Maximilian of Austria moved the Low Countries into the House of Habsburg. The grandchild of Mary and Maximillian, Charles the V, was born in Gent in the year 1500. Although a native of the city of Ghent, Charles V punished his hometown severely when the citizens refused to pay more war-taxes. Under the rule of Philip II of Spain, the son of Charles V, Ghent suffered like most other cities in Flanders and the low countries because of the continuous religious troubles between the Protestants and Catholics. Many people left the impoverished Flanders and settled in England and Germany. It was only under Archdukes Albert and Isabella that Gent would flourish once more. Later, the economic situation improved thanks to the construction of the canal between the Gent harbor and the city of Ostende. War, however, was never far away, especially when Louis XIV of France repeatedly tried to conquer Flanders. The Austrian period of the 18th century again brought peace and prosperity. New industries were developed (sugar refineries and cotton mills). In 1795, the former Austrian Netherlands were annexed to France. Beginning in 1800, the cotton industry began to flourish. A citizen of Ghent, Lieven Bauwens, had smuggled the plans for a cotton mill out of England. Ghent turned into one of the most important industrial centers of the French Empire. After the battle of Waterloo and the defeat of Napoleon, the French Netherlands were united with Holland, and the areas were combined to form the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. King William I founded Ghent University in 1817 and had the canal Ghent-Terneuzen constructed. Ghent continued to grow as an industrial center. The number of inhabitants tripled in the 19th century. The miserable working and housing conditions of the working-class resulted in the creation of the first Belgian trade union in Ghent. Ghent also played an important part in the Flemish movement in Belgium. In 1886, the Royal Academy of Language and Literature was founded. In 1930, Ghent University became a Dutch language university.


Ghent, in 2002, has a population of about 250,000 inhabitants, and is the capital of the Belgian province of East-Flanders.


Chapter 2 King Arthur and the City of Ghent The legend of King Arthur and the Knights of the Holy Grail is inextricably linked with Glastonbury in the English county of Somerset. It is less known that the City of Ghent played an important role in the legend. In the 10th century Abbot Dunstan from Glastonbury fled to Flanders for political reasons. At the Gent Saint Peter’s Abbey, he enjoyed the protection of Count Arnulf I. After two years, the abbot returned safely to Glastonbury. In his abbey - the largest one in England - he introduced the Benedictine rule he had become acquainted with in Gent. It is said that he left behind a mysterious book in Saint Peter’s Abbey in Gent. Two centuries later, the then Count of Flanders, Filips van den Elzas, handed the mysterious manuscript to his celebrated court poet Chrétien de Troyes. The manuscript would be the starting point for his Perceval ou le conte del Graal, which would make the legendary King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table forever famous.

Glastonbury Abbey The west doorway of the great church. The broken ends of the tracery screen filling the main arch and masking the elliptical arch over the doors are clearly visible.


Chapter 3 City on the Mouth of the River Between 1100 and 1500, Ghent played a prominent role among the major cities of northwestern Europe. The number of inhabitants from the 13th to the 15th century is estimated at around 65,000, which is just slightly less than Paris, but considerably more than London or Hamburg. Ghent owed its metropolitan character in the Middle Ages to its production of luxury woollen cloth and its excellent geographic location at the confluence of the two main rivers in Flanders, the Leie and the Scheldt, which provided good opportunities for trade. The cradle of Ghent once stood at the confluence of the Leie and Scheldt rivers. Indeed, the city's name means 'river mouth' or 'confluence'. This favourable geographic location has attracted and brought people together since pre-historic times. Archaeologists and toponymists have revealed much evidence of human presence going back as far as the Stone Age and the Iron Age. In the first centuries of our Era, during Roman rule, a fairly major village stood on the high sand ridge that stretched from Eenbeekeinde in Destelbergen to the confluence of the Leie and the Scheldt. People lived in safety, protected from the water. Further along the Scheldt, on Blandijnberg, stood a Roman villa. The substantial building called Blandinium or Blandijn (after one 'Blandius', one of the owners) was most probably the centre of a large agricultural holding. The large Germanic invasions of 406 and 407 put an end to Roman occupation. Germanic peoples, counted as Salian Franks, then settled in the Leie and Scheldt valleys permanently. The arrival and presence in Ghent of the missionary Amandus from 629 to 639 was an important turning point. Amandus was a former nobleman from the French region of Aquitaine. He brought with him letters from the Frankish king Dagobert I, which authorized him to baptize the local population by force if necessary. As so many of his contemporaries had done, the enterprising Frenchman would have travelled along the Leie or Scheldt by ship.


When Amandus wanted to go ashore near Ganda, the place where the ruins of Sint-Baafsabdij (the abbey of St Bavon) can now be seen, the hostile population threw him back into the water. He then moved up river and retired to a small monastery along the Scheldt for some time - probably on Blandijnberg, where Sint-Pietersabdij would later be built. Then came the day when a criminal was condemned to death and hung in Ganda. Amandus had the man secretly taken down from the gallows and brought to his monastery. Through prayer, Amandus was able to bring him back to life. This miracle was evidently so convincing that the local population asked to be baptized and went about destroying their pagan places of worship. And so it was that the population of Ghent was converted to

Christianity. Amandus subsequently founded two abbeys, Sint-Baafsabdij and Sint-Pietersabdij, together with his friend and disciple Bavon, who was also a former nobleman, originally from Haspengouw. If only the holy man had kept a diary; when great rivalry later arose between the two abbeys, they sought desperately to prove their 'elder birth-right'. Theft of reliquaries and falsification of ancient records were the order of the day for centuries, and even today the question of which abbey is the oldest is still hotly disputed among historians. Both abbeys founded the first churches for the inhabitants of the rural estates: Sint-Martinus in Ekkergem and Heilig-Kerst near Sint-Baafsabdij. The two abbeys flourished during the reign of emperor Charlemagne. None other than his famous confidant and biographer Einhard was lay-abbot of both abbeys from 815. Under his auspices the abbeys acquired the status of a royal institution. In the manner of a modern-day manager, he laid the foundations for them to develop into two of the most important abbeys in Flanders. The ecclesiastical and secular authorities created order and a sense of security with their new institutions and a number of population centres grew up in the Ghent region. Such a settlement already existed after 650 by the Reep, on the more elevated ground on and around Zandberg near the present-day cathedral (Sint-Baafskathedraal). Pedlars and traders no doubt brought their foreign goods in here along the Scheldt, at least whilst sufficient security reigned in the country.


Dark times came with the invasion of the Vikings, Scandinavian warriors who sailed their ships up the Scheldt. Sint-Baafsabdij was fortified and a nearby shipyard even began to build war ships, but to no avail. During their murderous raids between 879 and 883, the fearsome Norsemen pillaged the two abbeys and razed them to the ground. The newly-burgeoning settlement of Ghent was wiped off the map. After the upheaval and desperation of the Norman invasions came the era of the Counts of Flanders. Count Baldwin II the Bald brought order and peace to his earldom in a way that was seen nowhere else in western Europe and in doing so he established the conditions for the growth of the economy and the development of cities. He had a fortification built in Ghent on the left bank of the Leie, where the Gravensteen castle keep now stands. Seeking the protection this structure provided, the population came to regroup there and a market was built to provide for their needs. The present-day Groentenmarkt was built at the foot of the fortification. Radiating from the market, a major settlement formed.

The Graslei, 1998 Visit In the vicinity of the Graslei and the Korenlei, this settlement consisted mainly of merchants. Around 950, the old village by Zandberg was redeveloped. Along the axis formed by the Hoogpoort, the two centres gradually grew towards each other. The two Benedictine abbeys, which had risen from the ashes, completed the picture. By the turn of


the millennium they had regained possession of their ecclesiastic territories and agricultural estates. In the area between the Leie and the Scheldt, in the shadow of the fortress and bordered by the large abbeys, the rapid growth of the new Ghent began. The city exerted a magical attraction for many thousands of country folk. Additional places of worship were needed quickly and these became the first of the city churches. In 942, the Bishop of Tournai came to consecrate Sint-Janskerk (now Sint-Baafskathedraal). The precursors of today's Sint-Jacobskerk, Sint-Niklaaskerk and Sint-Michielskerk were also built before 1100. The feeling of togetherness of a large group of people who live close to each other soon led to political awareness. The motto, 'Stadslucht maakt vrij', advocating the emancipating powers of the city air, was created to highlight the distinction between the city and the surrounding countryside. Indeed, the population’s lack of freedom and complete dependency on the high lords would continue for many centuries. Around 1100, the city dwellers were able to persuade the Count that their territory should be placed under the judicial powers of a separate authority, namely their own bench of aldermen. And so the city, in the true sense of the word, was born. The budding city council demarcated its territorial jurisdiction by closing off the natural belt of water formed by the Scheldt and the meandering Leie with canals, thus creating the Ketelvest and the Houtlei, and possibly also the Kraanlei and the Ottogracht. The central area was partly ramparted and partly walled. Four solid gates were erected so that all incoming and outgoing traffic of people and merchandize could be checked. Soon the aldermen had designs on the areas bordering the outer edges of the city. Shortly after 1300, the city ramparts already measured almost 12.75 km in length, enclosing an area of 644 hectares/1,591 acres. The photo of the canals presented here was taken during the family’s trip to Ghent in 1998.


Chapter 4 Woollen Industry Ghent achieved its prosperity and the unstoppable growth that came with it through the production and trade of its famous woollen cloth. From 1100 to 1400, a good 60 percent of households earned a living from the industry. The processes of sorting the wool, washing, spinning and bleaching were the work of the semi-skilled and unskilled workers, women, children and people in the rural areas. The main processes, i.e., weaving, fulling (the process of felting the woollen cloth to make it thicker and smoother) and dying, were the work of specialists: men's work, which was done exclusively within the city. The best wool came from England. Ghent's weavers sold their finished luxury cloth all over Europe: in the German Rhineland, at the French annual fairs in Champagne, in northern Germany and in the countries on the Baltic Sea, as well as via the western trade route along the French Atlantic coast in Spain and Portugal and even in North Africa. The return cargo consisted of wine, salt and other consumer goods. The wealthy patricians (then still known as 'erfachtige lieden' or 'viri hereditarii'), who were the original owners of the land on which the city of Ghent was built, had become merchants, and profited most from this trade. This caused political upheavel as these merchants began to aspire to political and economic independence from the Count of Flanders. In 1180, the mighty Gravensteen was built, not so much to protect the city of Ghent but to control the people. The “39 aldermen” had the monopoly of local government, finance and administration of justice. They could not afford to ignore the social needs of the populous completely. Therefore, they built hospitals, gave alms, and set up charitable organizations. Repression and exploitation of the major part of the population were the price of the luxuriant lifestyle and the extreme hunger for power of the urban elite. In Ghent and other large Flemish cities, the craftsmen, who had organised themselves, began to protest against this situation in the early years of the 14th century. In July of 1302, they fought as Clauwaerts (so called because of their loyalty to the clawed Lion of Flanders) on the side of Count Guy of Dampierre against the French army of noblemen, on Groeningekouter at Kortrijk (Courtrai). To the amazement of the whole of Europe, they won. The upper class, who had chosen the side of the king of France, had bet on the wrong horse, and its supremacy on the city council was now broken once and for all. Craftsmen began to make their entry into the Ghent college of aldermen. These artisans were organized into guilds, and also functioned as real political associations. Their influence foreshadowed what is called the “welfare state” today. These guilds dominated the daily life of their members. They were part of the municipal militia, worshipped as a group, participated in processions, and had their own guild houses, chapels, and hospitals.


The weavers and fullers were the most numerous and bold craftsmen in this large city of cloth mills. Relations between the rich weavers and poor fullers grew more difficult, sometimes becoming violent. In 1338, they came together to safeguard the city’s prosperity. War had broken out between England and France (the Hundred Years’ War). Unemployment was high in Ghent as the export of cloth was especially vulnerable due to the war. The king of France was the suzerain of Flanders, and expected the Flemish to support and defend his interests. England supplied the raw material of wool to Ghent for its cloth mills. Therefore, a trade agreement was reached with the King of England, who visited Ghent. The crowd paid him homage as the rightful king of France. The Ghent textile workers were soon working at their looms again. John of Gaunt was born in the Ghent Abbey of St. Bavo in March 1340. He was the fourth son of England’s King Edward III and Philippa of Hainault. He played a major role in the Hundred Years’ War.


Chapter 5 The Bergundians By his marriage to Margaret of Male, the only daughter of the last count of Flanders, Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, gained possession of Flanders in 1383. The people of Ghent had previously been able to chase their counts out of their territory from time to time, but with the Dukes of Burgundy, that was harder to manage. They soon found that the Burgundians attached much greater importance to the far more peaceful neighbours of the Duchy of Brabant. There, the cities of Antwerp, Leuven (Louvain), Brussels, Mechelen (Malines) and 's-Hertogenbosch were in full expansion. Every upsurge of the desire for independence in Ghent was harshly repressed by the Burgundian rulers, and quashed with humiliating peace terms. To make matters worse, the Ghent cloth weavers were losing a lot of business to the competition of the new textile centres in the northwest of Europe, namely, Brabant, Holland and England, as well as to the cheaper workers of the Flemish countryside. The tide could not be stemmed, not even by the violent raids of the Ghent militia known as the White Caprons (Witte Kaproenen), who regularly went out to smash the peasants' looms to pieces. Although the signs of decay were unmistakable at all levels of urban society from 1350 onwards, Ghent continued to be a major centre of trade and industry. Hundreds of inhabitants benefited from Ghent's quasi-monopoly on the county's grain trade, thanks to the staple right, a privilege under which non-resident tradesmen were required to offer their corn for sale in the city. The wine trade flourished too. At the various quaysides, the 'schroeders' (parbucklers) worked their wooden cranes to unload barrels and other heavy loads.

For centuries, the Graslei and the Korenlei were the heart of the Ghent harbour. More than ever, the Ghent shipmasters now dominated shipping on the main Flemish inland waterways. They reaped the fruits of the never-ending concern of Ghent to have a good network of waterways. As early as the mid-13th century, the city council had extended the natural watercourses of the Lys and Scheldt with a canal

named the Lieve, no less than 45 km long, that connected Ghent with the Zwin near


Damme. After 1500, when the Bruges Zwin harbours had to cede their role as an international centre of commerce to Antwerp, Ghent responded by digging another canal, this time leading to Sas van Gent on the Westerscheldt, known as Sassevaart.


Chapter 6 Emperor Charles V The city administration build the formidable town hall in about 1500. They people had good reason to be proud of their city for it was here that the Van Eyck brothers had recently finished their famous altarpiece of The Adoration of the Lamb (in 1432) and that Hugo van der Goes had brought the art of the Flemish Primitives to great heights as master of the painters' guild. Ghent was also renowned for its tapestries. Eventually, however, the city’s treasury was empty and there were not enough funds to complete the building. There was a serious economic slump at the time. In 1537, Emperor Charles V wished to impose a heavy tax which would only add to all their troubles. The craftsmen went on strike which grew into rebellion. Unskilled workers were the boldest rebels, known as “creesers”. Charles V personally travelled to Ghent to punish the inhabitants of the city where he had been born in 1500. He abrogated their privileges, the proof of their independence, and abolished their right to exercise power outside the city walls with one stroke of his pen. Perhaps not without a touch of cynicism, he called his punitive law the Concessio Carolina (Caroline Concession). Fifty Ghent patricians, dressed only in white shirts, were made to beg for his mercy. They were barefoot and wore a noose around their necks as a sign that they had earned the gallows. Ever since, the people of Ghent have been known as 'Noose-bearers' (Stropdragers). More catastrophes followed. The voices of Luther and other reformers found a ready ear in Ghent. Already around 1530, the city was divided by a profound religious schism. The Ghent Protestants suffered heavily under the relentless Inquisition and the merciless implementation of the emperor's heresy edicts. From 1559 onwards, hardly a month went by without the stakes blazing high on Vrijdagmarkt or Sint-Veerleplein, sometimes with the execution of two or three 'heretics' at the same time. The reaction came in the form of the infamous iconoclastic fury of August 1566. Not a single church, monastery, convent or chapel remained undamaged by the vehemence of the Protestants. Twelve years later, the cathedral itself was stripped bare and whitewashed to serve for the Protestant services. A couple of agitators had seized power in a coup to which Prince William of Orange was privy, and had established a Protestant dictatorship. Ghent was the spearhead in the revolt of the Netherlands against King Philip II of Spain. The popular leaders started a regular round-up of Catholic clergymen. In their eyes, Ghent was to be turned into the 'Geneva of the North'.


When the Duke of Parma enabled the pendulum to swing once again to the Catholic side in 1584 by his conquest of Ghent on behalf of the king of Spain, many of the inhabitants of Ghent had had too much. About 15,000 people left. The majority were Protestants, of course, but they also included people who simply did not feel like staying in the moribund city. Most of them emigrated to the Northern Netherlands.


Chapter 7 Revival of Catholicism and Trade After 1600, the entire public life of the city was dedicated to the Catholic reconstruction, in both the literal and the figurative sense. Literally dozens of destroyed or badly damaged monasteries, convents, churches, beguinages, chapels and almshouses were repaired or rebuilt on a grand scale. It was the era of the triumphant Baroque architecture. In its entire history, Ghent has rarely seen such building activity as in the years between 1600 and 1660. About 56 contractors employed nearly a thousand construction workers. The city council encouraged private citizens to make their own contributions to the 'cieraet van deser stede' (embellishment of this city). Roughly two dozen new religious orders established themselves in the city, especially female orders. The principal newcomers were the Jesuits. With their catechism lessons, their Congregations of the Blessed Virgin, their retreats and their missions, they were to reach nearly all layers of the urban population, from young to old. From then on, devotion and discipline would be the order of the day for everyone. In their colleges, the Jesuits and the Augustinians not only endeavoured to acquaint boys and young men with the Classics and to stage their own plays, but also, and foremost, to initiate them in the Catholic teachings and morality. The figure that towered above all the others involved in this Catholic revival was the Ghent bishop, Antoon Triest, a man who excelled in piety and charity. He was a tireless organiser. Seated in his coach, in which he departed daily from the episcopal palace (now the seat of the provincial administration), he was a familiar sight to the townspeople. On average, every three years he personally visited each of the 150 parishes of his diocese. He left many marks of his love and patronage of the arts. The bishop not only personified the new religious spirit and the flourishing of the arts, he was also a symbol of Ghent's tentative economic revival. The prospects of Ghent commerce and inland shipping were greatly improved by the digging of the canal from Ghent to Bruges, which was further connected to the harbours of Ostend and Dunkirk (1613-1640). Soon, barges plied these canals, carrying both passengers and freight. The barges were drawn by teams of two horses. Every day at 10 a.m., one barge would leave Ghent and another would leave Bruges. Every year, they carried about 50,000 passengers from Ghent to Bruges or the other way


around. One of the most famous of the people who departed Ghent in 1717 was the Russian Tsar Peter the Great. After 1700, the new direct connection to the sea made the more enterprising inhabitants of Ghent look to the wide world again. Ghent traders fitted out ships bound for China and India in 1714-1715. A few years later, Jan Baptist van Goethem and a group of other Ghent citizens helped to found the Oostendse Compagnie, a company for international marine commerce. Today, the imposing Hotel Van Goethem on Ingelandgat still stands as a witness to this profitable activity. In the peaceful times that started in 1740 under the prosperous reign of the Austrian Empress Maria Theresia, Ghent had its first great economic revival since the Middle Ages. With the powerful support of the municipal and central authorities, enterprising merchants established 'manufacturen' or factories. The first sugar refineries appeared in 1750. These first real factories, which fell completely outside the framework of the traditional craftsmen's guilds, heralded an era of capitalist industry. Over time, the 'cotton barons' came to dominate the scene with their spinning mills, bleach works, dye houses and cotton-printing shops. Transport of their wares was no longer limited to inland shipping. From Ghent, new and perfectly straight cobbled roads were laid to all the larger cities and towns in the vicinity. These roads have survived more or less intact to this day, in the form of the contemporary district roads. The factory owners became rich and sought to imitate the lifestyle of the aristocracy. They purchased titles, married into distinguished families, started to collect art, and built themselves opulent residences in the French style. When the Theatre of St Sebastian opened on the Kouter in 1715, Ghent even had its own opera, the favourite and fashionable meeting place of the city's aristocracy and bourgeoisie. Around 1800, the mechanisation of the textile industry brought Ghent to a new industrial awakening. At the time, the city belonged to France. The principles of the French Revolution were applied here just as radically as in the rest of France, down to the introduction of a new form of city council, which has survived to this day. In the name of modern liberties, the privileges of the church were abolished. For the workers, there was a prohibition on association. The factory bosses, on the other hand, were given free rein, and now they suddenly had an enormous market for their products in the French hinterland. An early feat of industrial espionage was pulled off by Lieven Bauwens, who smuggled spinning and weaving machines and steam engines from England to his native city. Ghent, this centre of industry, was


called 'the Manchester of the continent'. It was only natural therefore that the city wished to have their own canal that would connect its port directly with the North Sea. A canal was dug from Ghent to Terneuzen. After its opening in 1827, real sea-going vessels sailed into the city for the first time in its history. From now on, many generations of dockworkers would earn their living with hard labour on the quayside. The patrician residences in the French style that were built after 1750 were still among the most luxurious in the city at the beginning of the 19th century. They were extremely comfortable residences that played a role in the international events of their times, such as the fall of the French Empire of Napoleon. In 1815, during the Hundred Days after Napoleon's escape from Elba, the French King Louis XVIII stayed at the Hotel d'Hane Steenhuyse. (To ears accustomed to the Ghent dialect, 'Louis Dix-huit' sounds just like 'Loewie die zwiet', 'Louis Who Sweats'.) Former guests are Tsar Alexander I of Russia in 1814 and King William I of the Netherlands in 1816. The Duke of Wellington stayed in another of these hotels, the Hotel Clemmen (now the Vander Haeghen Museum), for a few days on his way to Waterloo. The Treaty of Ghent put an end to the Second Anglo-American War. The American Delegation stayed in Ghent in 1814 during the negotiations with the British. The leader of the delegation, John Quincy Adams, the future president of the United States, maintained very cordial relations with the people of Ghent.


Chapter 8 City of Textiles The main characteristic of Ghent in the period from 1800 to 1930 was its nature of a city of large textile factories and workers. In 1930, approximately 35,000 workers were employed in 1,200 factories and workshops. The population rose at a spectacular rate, from 61,000 in 1815 to more than 175,000 in 1930. The textile industry had come to dominate the city to such an extent that even the venerable Gravensteen was converted into a spinning mill, with workers' houses built against it. The abolished monasteries and convents were put to similar uses. Lieven Bauwens established his first factory in the former Carthusian monastery on Fratersplein. For a hundred years, workers from the surrounding countryside flocked into the city and lived in appalling squalor in miserable slums. They coped with bad working conditions, low wages, degrading living conditions, lack of elementary hygiene, and the recurrent scourge of cholera epidemics. These conditions gave rise to the trade unions. There was an immense chasm between the lives of the workers and those of the factory bosses and bourgeoisie. These conditions are what the Boerjans experienced when they returned to Belgium in the late 1800’s. The majority of the population were supporters of the Dutch King William I. These Orangemen greatly favoured the expansion of commerce and industry. Both French and Dutch were spoken in Ghent, although Dutch was generally the language of the people. The rather coarse but very expressive Ghent dialect was not eradicated by the more generalized use of standard Dutch. On the contrary, dialect-speaking variety artists remained enormously popular, both among the lower classes and the bourgeoisie. After 1830, the city changed dramatically. Until then, it had largely remained as it had been in the Middle Ages, with lots of green areas. Now, industry changed the face of the city with numerous factories and workers' housing estates, built in what is now called the '19th-century belt'. Secondly, there was the mechanisation of public transport. On 28 September 1837, 500 prominent Ghent citizens rode into Zuidstation on the first steam train of the line Mechelen-Dendermonde-Ghent, through Muinkmeersen. This train station in the south district of Ghent was also the departure point of the first 'tramway américain', a horse-drawn tram that became operational in 1874. There was a line to Vlasmarkt and Dampoort and another that went over the Kouter to the Court of Justice. Later, the Korenmarkt became the second main tramline junction. By 1899, the tramway company was already running seven lines, with battery trams that were painted green. In 1905, the familiar electric trams with their overhead wires first appeared.


Ghent saw radical urban renewal during the World Exhibition in 1913. The inner city was completely redesigned. There were new initiatives, one being the beautiful Museum of Fine Arts. The above photo was taken during the family visit to Ghent in 1998. You will notice that vehicular traffic is not allowed on the streets, except for the street cars. In the years between the two world wars, working conditions improved drastically, with achievements such as an 8-hour working day, 6-day work week, and paid annual holidays. The economic crisis of the 1930’s and the German occupation during the Second World War made life miserable for the urban population. During the Allies’ final offensive, the period from May to September 1944, parts of the city were hard hit by bombardments. After 1950, Ghent recovered at a breathtaking speed. Improvements in employment after 1960 lead to the majority of the people of Ghent being able to benefit from the new welfare society – a house of their own with a garden, a car, and an annual holiday at the Belgian seaside resorts.


The municipal reorganization of 1977 merged a number of surrounding villages with Ghent, creating a new city of 250,000. The urban flight to the countryside continued unabated. At the same time, the inner city was made more attractive. Monuments were restored and pedestrian shopping areas were created. In a drastic traffic plan put in place in 1997, car traffic was banned from the inner city.


Chapter 9 Living Conditions

The Boerjans were peasant farmers who lived in East Flanders. Boerjan translated from Flemish is “Farmer John”. The Boerjans lived around the villages of Lembeke, Maldegem, Oste Eeklo (East Eeklo), Assenede, and Evergem. The largest and nearest market center was Ghent, and the family walked to Ghent on market days. The following is an attempt to illustrate what day-to-day life was like for our ancestors. We see from the Boerjan history prepared by Urbain Boerjan that there were a few Boerjans that committed crimes and served time in prison. Studying their living conditions may provide reasons for these crimes

PeasantsPeasantsPeasantsPeasants

Rural poverty gradually appeared early in the 19th century as the industrial revolution got underway. The Walloon parts of southern Belgium (Liege, Namur and some of Hainaut) tended to fare better because they were quick to invest in the new industrial technologies in coal mining operations and other heavy industries. However, the rural economies of Flanders remained dependent on labour-intensive agriculture and on poorly paying cottage industries, such as spinning and weaving. Before the industrial revolution, spinning and weaving in the homes contributed an important part to rural peoples' incomes, supplementing their earnings from farm work. But poverty increased as the work of these cottage industries moved into factories in towns and the effects of this were further aggravated by the increasing difficulty of providing adequate amounts of farming l and because the population doubled between 1846 and 1947 and grew from 4.3 to 8.5 million people.

In contrast to what was happening in neighboring countries, Belgium was still characterized by small unproductive farms that continued to use primitive methods which were not always able to ensure an adequate food supply. An ongoing fragmentation of the farms meant that the farm size became smaller and smaller and the variety of the crops larger. Many members of large farming families could no longer find employment on the farm, thus causing a considerable labor surplus. This surplus population left farming to make a living elsewhere. As a result, between 1846 and 1947 the agricultural population dropped by 62% from 1,075,031 to 412,026. Some of these people moved into towns to work in new factories. Others moved to work seasonally in France and Holland,


usually at the time that the sugar beet crop needed cultivation. And may thousands emigrated permanently to the United States and Canada.

Poverty was less severe in the northeastern provinces, Antwerp and Limburg, because population density was lower and because the soil was sandy and less fertile than in Flanders. The people there had long been accustomed to surviving by small-scale, self-sufficient, subsistence farming.

However, in West and East Flanders, and in parts of Brabant many of the unemployed sought financial assistance as shown below.

In addition to the gradual loss of income from the move of cottage-based spinning and weaving to factories in the towns, effects of the industrial revolution were aggravated by a gradual decrease in the size of family farms. This was the result of two major factors: the population increase caused a progressive decrease in the size of parcels of land inherited by farmers' sons. From about 1830 to 1870 the number of holdings under 0.5 hectares (under 1.5 acres) rose, reflecting the progressive subdivision of the land into less-and-less viable farming lots. Thereafter there was a gradual consolidation of the land by the land owners into more profitable larger farming units.

In order to survive, additional income had to be found and the rural population tried to earn extra money by working in their homes. However, spinning in cottages disappeared as it moved to large factories such as that of Lieven Bauwens in Ghent. This was further aggravated by the subsequent loss of weaving of fine woolen goods. Then in 1842, linen


weaving in Flanders became mechanized and this last of the major cottage crafts gradually ceased.

Very, very few farmers owned land they cultivated. They were mostly tenants of large land owners who demanded high rents for land, based on their expected crops' value. This rent, averaging perhaps 30 percent of that value, was determined by agreement long before the crops were harvested and the rent remained fixed regardless of yield or prices at market time. On top of that, they had to pay during peacetime a tax of 5 percent, and this rose to 10 to 20 percent in wartime. A further 10 percent of their income went to support the priest and to maintain the church, amounting to a total of about 50 percent of their farming income, leaving barely enough money to live on. Many could not survive on this and hired themselves out as farmer laborers ('boerenknechte' or 'dagloners'), doing the sowing or harvesting on farms in summer and working as weavers in their cottages during the fall and winter. Most of the weaving of linen cloth in cottages was done by the men.

The family at this time typically lived on the edge of poverty. People made do with clothing. This gradual degradation of the poor is reflected in the changing occupations of bridegrooms on marriage records and of the fathers on birth certificates. Beginning early in the century, the occupation 'landbouwer' (farmer) on these documents changed to 'dagloner'. Such families saved as much of the money they earned as laborers for essential purchases. Even the cheapest pair of shoes cost 5 days' labour. They grew much of their own food, especially potatoes, in a small garden and pastured a cow on grass along public roads for milk. A pig who had been fed food scraps was slaughtered in the autumn and its meat smoked or salted down for use in the winter. Their monetary income was supplemented by weaving or spinning during winter season.

For our ancestors, life was always lived on the edge. Economics and the prevailing social structures of their time combined to keep the tenant farmers and their helpers ('boerenknechten') firmly in their 'place' in the world.

For the poor, the realities of life were cruel and they had to be totally dedicated to the mere act of survival. In the cottages, women did lace work and handiwork at home by candlelight or kerosene lamp. Here, the middlemen merchants who supplied the raw materials and 'bought' the products benefited more than the cottage workers. Such lace makers and seamstresses often went blind in the process. Often


the only furnishings in the cottages were a table, bed, trunk or a couple of chairs and some kitchen utensils.

The gradual overall deterioration of life was aggravated by the population explosion that coincided with industrialization, and many country folk were uprooted and forced to seek employment in factories in the urban centers.

By the 19th century, the potato had become the staple food of the poor people of Belgium as it helped to fill empty stomachs better than bread. In 1845, the harvest of potatoes and grain was reduced to 30 percent of normal. The importance of the potato had grown in recent years. In 1713, the potato was not used at all, in 1740 it began to be traded at the market, and by 1775 the potato was the main food of the poor.

In the months of July and August 1845, aided by damp weather, an extremely virulent form of the fungus Phytophtora Infectans resulted in a very unpredictable harvest, first in Belgium and then in the Netherlands. The rest of Europe followed, especially in Ireland, where the potatoe famine is renowned. Estimated losses due to this potato plague amounted from one quarter to one half of the crop. In the provinces of West and East Flanders this figure was as high as 90 percent. The disease reared its head again in July 1946, "The fields were black in two to three weeks time and the smell blew over the roads"3.The disaster became complete when the barley crop also failed.

Famines never occur in isolation. Poorly fed people living in closely packed small houses under unhygienic conditions encouraged infestation of the lice that often carried the typhus organism. These conditions resulted in frequent epidemics of typhus. Cholera due to poor sanitation combined with poor nutrition because of the semi-starvation diets, particularly after a crop failure, and endemic typhus produced periodic disasters. It became a routine duty of the local 'veldwachter' (policeman) to visit often each cottage in the community. Often he would find everyone dead.

As time went by, income slowly increased:


Rural Economy in the 18th and 19th CenturiesRural Economy in the 18th and 19th CenturiesRural Economy in the 18th and 19th CenturiesRural Economy in the 18th and 19th Centuries

The causes of emigration to North America from Belgium in the late 18th and early 19th centuries to North America were complex. A major factor was the progressive impoverishment of the rural economy that started around 1810. But this had been preceded by a relative prosperity in the 18th century while the country was ruled from Austria by a series of benevolent despots including Maria-Theresia and Joseph II. This progress was halted by defeat of the Austrians by the revolutionary French in 1794. It was during the 20-year period of French hegemony that lasted until 1815 that the rural decline, particularly in the Flemish-speaking of Belgium, began. Some of this had its roots in the economic and social system that characterized the “Ancien Regime”.

During the relative prosperity in those regions in the 1700s, the rural population began to rise faster than opportunities for rural employment. This was particularly striking in the parts of Flanders where the soil was sandy and of relative poor agricultural quality. This growing population was accompanied by a rise in rural industry based on the age-old Flemish involvement in the flax-linen industry. For centuries the cottage-based spinning of flax and its weaving into linen during the winters had supplemented farmers' incomes. However, after about 1740, the linen industry came to occupy ever-increasing numbers of rural folk on a full-time basis. Land rental rates, usually determined by city-based absentee landlords, remained high and farming plots grew progressively smaller as the population grew, in some cases being reduced to less than a hectare (about 2.5 acres). Middle-man merchants, also city-based, took advantage of what was a buyer's market and paid very low prices for the finished linen cloth. This and poor food crop yields resulted in an impoverished rural proletariat had a high infant mortality rate, was chronically undernourished and lived under deplorable conditions. Because of their low incomes, they sought summer work with more prosperous farmers who also paid low wages to these day laborers ('dagloners'). Some obtained work as seasonal migrants in France and Wallonia.

In the last half of the 18th century, agricultural practices improved producing better yields in the more fertile sandy loam regions. As a result of this, there was a decline of rural industry, poverty was reduced, population growth slowed, and infant mortality rates dropped.

After 1810, the rural linen industry declined but was temporarily replaced by rural cotton weaving, which provided material through middle-men to the cotton-printing factories in the cities, particularly Ghent. However, by the early 1820s, power looms started to appear in the city factories, and by 1850 the non-mechanized rural cotton and the equally labor-intensive flax and linen industries were moribund. This was a gradual death, and some rural producers of high quality linen survived into the late 1800s. This gradual death of the rural


textile industries slowed the migration from the countryside to the cities and perhaps emigration to 'Amerika'.

Life in Flanders in the Life in Flanders in the Life in Flanders in the Life in Flanders in the 1800s1800s1800s1800s

The lifestyle in rural Belgium was reflected in the working and living conditions at the turn of the 19th century in Flemish Brabant were all vastly different than are today.

Many of the children did not attend school because they were required to work. However, they may have attended a "Sunday school" organized by the local priest for teaching of the catechism, and some managed to learn to read while there. No doubt, the education received by such children from moderately poor families was not up the high standard offered in the monastic and private schools of the time.

The farmer still worked his acres of land by hand. A common saying among farmers was "My spade is like gold to me" ("De spa is goude mijn").

It is difficult to obtain a balanced picture of just how extensive such hard labor may have been because most writers of the time had not lived the farmer's life but rather projected a romantic upper class view of what was happening. Thus Karl Van de Woestyne praised "the skilled hand, the dignified, sure step of the sower as he scattered the seeds". Another observer detected an almost festive air during hay mowing (remember this was done by gangs of men wielding scythes): "Mowing took a long time in the suffocating heat of July. No sound of machines disturbed the stillness of the valley. For kilometers around one heard only the rustic sounds: the 'swish' of the scythes, the clear ring of the smith's hammer, the occasional crowing of the cocks and, in the afternoon, the church bell's call to the Angelus."

Another observer, Frédéric Kiesel, remembered "the healthy smell of the air as the mowers wielded their scythes and reaping hooks with virtuoso skills. Everyone, from children to old folk, headed to the fields on such days, each knowing their task. The women followed the mowers, gathering the swathes, with the children helping. Then the wagons, brimming with hay, were driven into the barn".


Late in the Autumn was the time for reaping wheat and rye. Once the grain had been brought into the barns, threshing to loosen the grain kernels from the stems began with threshing flails. These were long wooden handles with a shorter piece attached to its end by a leather strap. The thresher raised the handle on high and brought the short flail down hard horizontally on the sheaves lying on the threshing floor. From All Saints' Day until Easter, gangs of threshers were busy in the barn. The best of them brought down their fail twice a minute! A writer of the time called these rhythmic sounds 'the song of the flail'.

Such romantic-sounding but hard labor gradually disappeared, so that by 1911, in the district around Leuven, fewer and fewer farmers used the threshing flail and rented or purchased small threshing machines.

After threshing, the grain was separated from the chaff by winnowing. The threshed grain was shaken in reed baskets so the chaff dropped on the ground, leaving the grain kernels. On larger (richer) farms winnowing was gradually replaced by mechanized methods early in the new century.

During the 'Belle Époque', the period from about 1890 to 1914, often fondly recalled at the time by the prosperous classes in Belgium, the life and work of the average farmer continued to flow in the age-old slow rhythm of the seasons. The casual passerby might gather the impression of peace and freedom from such scenes.

During the disastrous period from 1880 to 1895, when foreign grain was imported at unbelievably low prices, the local price of wheat fell from 31 francs per bushel in 1881 to 14 francs in 1895.

Nevertheless, the farmer persisted in the traditional ways of farming rather than trying to increase profits. "What my grandfather did is good enough for me" remained the Golden Rule of village wisdom. They thought only the uncertainties of the weather could work against them, and so they let "God's water flow over God's acres". The old farmers in their blue denim overalls would listen silently to 'outsider' advocates of new ways of making a better life for them. Their rugged faces betrayed no emotion as they went home with a shrug. They were not about to accept such ideas. When the farmer did need a draft animal to roll a field, he might harness his cow or, if necessary, he and the family would pull the harrow. The field probably was planted with flax seed. Flax seeding was always followed by cultivation known as shallow harrowing and rolling


Sooner or later, the farmers had to accept new, more modern ways of farming in order to remain on their farms. Otherwise, they were required to move to the towns or cities to find work in factories, as many did, or migrate to other countries where farm land was nearly free.

Day WorkersDay WorkersDay WorkersDay Workers

Dagloners were men, although some women (daglonsters) and even children also worked for a daily wage. A dagloner was a worker who worked for a boer but did not live on the boer's farm, so he himself had to provide food, clothing, living quarters for his family and other needs. In Flanders as a whole in 1822, a dagloner earned 1 to 1.5 francs per day, a woman 0.6 to 0.9 francs. If only the man worked, his wife could afford to provide only a basic diet of porridge (possibly made with milk), soup and potatoes. To supplement this meager diet, the wife had to work and often the children too, especially if they were numerous, as they usually were. In the earlier, somewhat more prosperous period around 1800, with a man's earnings, a housewife might have been able to add some rye bread and sometimes some cheese and occasionally, herring.

Most dagloners, being the sons of farmers, tried to find a piece of land they could rent, perhaps 1/10 to 1/5 of an acre on which they grew food for their family. A goat for milk and rabbits for meat often were kept in separate quarters in the house. They often would buy little pigs and fatten them for 6 to 9 months, sell one or more, but slaughtered and preserved one for family use as hams and bacon which were soaked in brine of 4 - 6 weeks and then smoked. In these various ways, they could save their earnings for other essential but expensive needs, such as shoes, which might cost earnings from 5 days' work!

The family usually lived in a thatched cottage built in the wattle and daub style, like the one below.


Work was sometimes hard to find and seasonal. For example, a dagloner might work full time for a farmer in May and June on two hectares of flax. While the flax grew, he would go to Holland to cultivate beets. The flax would mature in about 100 days, giving him another 7 to 8 days of work harvesting flax and placing it to soak in water ('retting') to loosen the fibers. Depending on the weather, retting might take up to 8 weeks. Then after washing, drying, beating of the stalks to loosen the fibers, followed by combing, the flax fibers would be ready for spinning, and then weaving into linen.

In August, the dagloner would go back to the flax field to cultivate it, often using just a hoe and pick, to prepare for seeding the next crop.

If a dagloner had the capital to purchase a loom, he might contract with the farmer to spin and weave the flax from this field. However, most could not afford to buy a loom, but they might rent one from a contractor who would provide a loom and often flax too. In return, he would require the dagloner to spin and weave the flax he had provided into linen. In either cases, after the wife had spun the flax fibers, the dagloner would weave it into linen fabric. Because farming work fell off in the autumn, spinning and weaving would be a way for the dagloner’s family to make a living in the winter.

Fortunately for the dagloners, the machines available in the factories early in the century tended to break the flax fibers. This probably explains the persistence of the cottage-


based linen industry right up to the end of the 19th century, long after cottage-based wool spinning and weaving of wool had been displaced by factories.

The dagloner's children would often obtain work beginning in their 10th or 11th year! "Weeding gangs" of 30 to 40 children were assembled by a 'weeding boss' who contracted with farmers to have their fields weeded and would move from field to field. Each child would work daily from dawn to 7 or 8 in the evening to earn about the half the wage of an adult dagloner. The 'weeding boss' often had a grocery story as a sideline which mothers were expected to patronize to assure their children found work with the 'boss'!

The dagloner's wife found little work outside their cottage: perhaps a few days a week in February laying the flax in water to soak ('retting') and 2 weeks work at the end of March planting potatoes. She might find a month’s work of weeding but from the end of March to the end of April she was usually unemployed. In June, she probably could work a few days in the flax field.

There is no doubt that the dagloners and their families, being at the bottom of the economic ladder, suffered most during 'hard times'!

The FamilyThe FamilyThe FamilyThe Family

The family was the basic unit of production and consumption in pre-industrial Northwestern Europe. Many of the features of the family described in the following paragraphs were inherited from the feudal middle ages through the "Ancien Regime" under the Habsburg monarchs, survived the French occupation and start to wane in Belgium only after the onset of the industrial revolution around 1830. The household mode of organization predominated on farms, in artisans' workshops and in small merchants' shops. This developed into what is known as the family economy.

A household almost invariably consisted of a married couple, their children through their early teenage years, and the servants. Usually the household had only 5 to 6 members, and more than two generations living together was unusual. High mortality and late marriages precluded extended families of three generations: grandparents rarely lived with their children and grandchildren.

Children were an integral part of the household economy but in their early teens they usually left to find work in a household other than their own. An exception might be a child of an artisan who remained to acquire the valuable skills of his/her parent(s). In general,


whether a child remained to work at home or went elsewhere depended on which way they could contribute most to the income of their own family. Sometimes when the family was on the edge of becoming destitute the children might be sent or allowed to work. Children often would be expected to work excessive hours and in dangerous situations.

Young people eventually would leave home to marry and start an independent household of their own. The age of marriage was relatively late: over 26 years for men and for women over 23 years. After marriage they soon started a family of their own. It was not unusual for marriage to occur after a long courtship when the woman was already pregnant. The new family would soon employ a servant who, with their growing children, would contribute to whatever form of livelihood the household used to support itself.

The term “servant” in this context was quite different from that describing a person who worked for a wealthier family, usually of a higher social class. In the usual rural family unit, a servant was not necessarily of a lower class and ate and lived 'almost' as a family member. Being a servant for as long as 10 years enabled the servant to acquire skills they could not learn at home, and to accumulate enough money to contribute to the establishment of a new household. Women usually contributed equally to this by adding a self-generated 'dowry'. This explained the prolonged courtships and delayed age of marriage common into the 1800s.

As noted above, the family economy was the fundamental unit of production and consumption. People thought and worked in terms of sustaining the economic life of the family, and its members saw themselves as working together as interdependent rather than in an individualistic or independent manner. The goal of the household was to produce or pay for enough food and other necessities to meet their needs. Almost everyone lived within a household of some kind because it was almost impossible for ordinary people to support themselves independently. Those people living outside a household, other than those in religious orders, were often suspected of living off criminal activities, or potentially becoming dependent on others.

Within this type of subsistence economy, all family members needed to work. On a farm, much of the effort went into growing food and producing other agricultural products (flax, milk. butter, etc.) that could be exchanged for food. However, few people had enough land to support the household from farming alone. In such families, some members might work for wages elsewhere and send wages home. A father or older children might become migrant workers and leave their farm's work to be done by the mother and younger children. Surviving harvest failures (often every 3rd or 4th year) or economic slumps dictated no one could be idle.


In Flanders, rural family income was supported by growing and processing flax into linen cloth. This cottage industry was exploited at various levels by merchants and other middlemen. It survived until the onset of the industrial revolution when spinning machines and steam-driven mechanical looms destroyed the profitability of the cottage industry. This and a succession of harvest failures brought poverty, epidemics, and actual starvation to the region and was a major factor in encouraging emigration to North America.

Women and the Family Economy

A woman's life was in large measure a function of her capacity to establish and maintain a household. For most women, except for those in religious orders, marriage was an economic necessity and fulfilled sexual and psychological needs. Her life was devoted first to supporting her parents' household economy and then to assuring that she had her own household in which to live. In most cases, the bearing and raising of children was less important than the first two goals.

By the age of seven, girls already did housework, fed the chickens, watered the animals and carried food and drink to those working in the fields. Once a girl's parents and brothers could cope with the farm work, her labor at home lost its value and she left home, usually between the age of 12 and 14 years, usually to work on another nearby farm. However, she might migrate to a nearby town or city to live in another household as a servant. Her chief aim was to accumulate a dowry which allowed her to become an equal economic partner in a new household when she married.

If her husband held enough farm land to support them, the wife would spend much of her time carrying things to her husband - water, food, seed, harvested grain and flax. To allow her to continue her contributions soon after giving birth, the newborn infants often would be placed with a wet nurse. Sometimes it might prove more profitable for her to work herself as a wet nurse in a nearby town or city. But if her husband became a migrate worker she would be in charge of the farm and undertake the plowing, planting and harvesting herself with the aid of her children. If an economic disaster such as the death of her husband struck, a woman might maintain family income by taking outside work, by sending other family members off to seek work or, as is well recorded, by sending them to beg in the streets.

In the countryside, even though starvation might face the family, children were rarely abandoned, but in the cities a surprising number of newborn infants were brought anonymously to the Foundling Homes.


EmigrationEmigrationEmigrationEmigration

Even before the "hunger years" (1843-1850), the destruction by urban industrialization of the flax-based cottage industry of the rural people had been rapidly accelerating, and many small farmers were encouraged to emigrate overseas. Before leaving, they sold or rented out their land before getting on board ship2 and paid for their trip with their own money or with the help of their parents, as a loan on their heritage.

The failure of the home-based flax industry combined with repeated crop failures, particularly the potato crop - the poor man's staple, created large numbers of destitute people who often were reduced to begging and wandering around the countryside and into towns as vagabonds, looking for work. To organize food and lodging support, these people were collected into "beggar colonies" near the towns and cities in Flanders. Such colonies existed at or near Antwerpen, Bergen, Brugge, Hoogstraaten, Rekkem and Ter Kameren. Destitute people often entered such settlements voluntarily for up to a year but others were committed to them by magistrates. In either case, the municipality where they had lived became responsible for the cost of feeding and lodging them in these "colonies". Because the municipalities had lost much of their tax revenue due to the depressed economy, they looked for ways to reduce the costs of supporting people in the "colonies", especially for those who stayed for a year.

Some people were encouraged to emigrate to Central and South America, but many returned because of the climate and tropical diseases. The welfare office of Ghent helped those who wished to move to France by paying their travel and household moving expenses and giving them a small amount of money to tide them over for the first few days in their new 'home'. Another approach was developed by the Council of the Province of Antwerpen. It encouraged the "socially fallen" in its "beggars’ colony" to emigrate overseas to places where they would remain, such as the United States or Canada.

Other municipalities in Flanders soon followed Antwerpen's example with the support and help of that province's administration to organize the emigration of likely candidates from the "colonies" at Ghent, Brugge, Hoogstraaten, Rekkem and Ter Kameren. Preparation became more elaborate and cost 186 Francs per person (mostly men?). This included the ticket for between deck" passage, money for food for 77 days, kitchen utensils for preparing meals, pocket money, and each person was provided with trousers, a vest, working overalls, 2 shirts, 2 pairs socks, a pair of shoes, a trunk, a towel, a comb and hair brush, white soap, needles and thread, a straw-filled mattress and pillow, a bed cover, a pipe and tobacco. To make sure these emigrants would be acceptable, they were to be "mustered" on the ship as sailors! Efforts were also made to hide the fact that most of


the emigrants came from beggars’ colonies and that some were people whose sentence to a colony or jail had been commuted when they agreed to leave Belgium.

This procedure went smoothly until in April 1854 when the captain of the ship Ann Washburn insisted that each emigrant should have a ticket to show that he would be traveling further into the interior of the U.S. and would not become a burden to the city of New York where they would disembark. The same year, the captain of the ship Rochambeau and the American Consul in Antwerpen became suspicious that many of the travelers were in fact beggars because they brought little baggage. When the ship arrived in New York, 12 of the 350 passengers were jailed on the grounds that the entry of foreign ex-criminals was prohibited. However, with the payment of $20 for each of the 12 arrested immigrants, they were allowed to proceed to St. Louis. Following that uproar, the Belgian government denied any knowledge of the plan to send beggars out of the country. Next, the governor of the Province of Antwerpen spread the word that there would be no trouble if such emigrants went to Canada. He also implied that they could reach the American Midwest by passing through Canada. Later, the three Belgian Ministries involved in the matter assured the U.S. authorities that the emigration of beggars, vagabonds and released convicts would be halted. This may have been a wise decision since the Belgian Consul in Chicago reported that these immigrants arrived barren of resources. Although they began to earn more money than they had in Belgium, they remained poor: they had merely changed their geographic place of misery from Belgium to America.

Between 1850 and 1885, a total of 557 beggars and people released from the beggar colonies of the province of Antwerp were sent off as emigrants, mostly to the U.S. From the other 4 beggar colonies in Flanders, 535 emigrated during the same years. We have no reports from any of these emigrants about their experiences in their new home and none described their former state of social degradation in Belgium.

The Red Star Line after 1872 disinfected baggage to make sure that the poorer emigrants from Belgium and those from the rest of Europe who boarded in Antwerp did not contaminated the ships with vermin.

Our ancestors came to the U.S. in the early to mid 1890’s. They were among the many farmers that were lured to America by the advertisements of the American government who wished to have successful European farmers settle the American west. However, a few generations earlier, there were Boerjans who had served prison terms for theft.


ReligionReligionReligionReligion

Belgium has been an intensely religious country since the middle of the first millennium. In most families, at least one son or daughter took Holy Orders as a priest or nun.

Simple chapels, such as the one in the picture below, were located along the roads and at crossroads and were common places of worship for ordinary folk who often stopped to pray.


More elaborate pilgrimages also took place:

This scene, "Candlelight Procession in Scherpenheuvel ", a popular pilgrimage site in Flemish Brabant1, was painted in 1903 by F. Van Leemputten.

Adults and children with various afflictions, some leaning on canes, are seen moving in a candlelit procession ('kaarskensprocessie') on a path around the church, circling the church (now a Basilica) three times or more. Note the woman carrying a sick infant and the nun following the boy leading the procession. The people in the foreground are probably praying for Divine help for those seeking a cure or at least an amelioration of their condition. The mass of people on the far side of the path and behind the wall at the back indicates that this was a major event in the lives of these people. In Catholic countries, there still are shrines/chapels/grottos that 'specialize' in various medical problems and diseases.

The people of Flanders were converted to Christianity early in the first millennium, but they reverted to paganism during the rule of the Franks in the 4th to 6th centuries. However, they again became devout Christians because of the work of missionaries from Ireland (not from Rome!) in the 7th and 8th centuries. Their devotion was reflected in a close attachment to their priests who supported them in their spiritual life, conducting


and recording until near the end of the 18th century all their baptisms, marriages and burials. The Church always supported the prevailing social order. At first this was the feudal system with ordinary folk serving as serfs, by law, of the local overlord. The overlords were replaced in time by landowners to whom the ordinary farm folk remained attached as tenants, sometimes becoming relatively rich.

The first parishes were organized in the 8th - 9th century. When people wanted a church for their community, they had to donate 10 percent of their harvest as a stipend ('tithing') for the priest's maintenance and for the building and repair of a church. This relationship between the people and their Church continued until 1798 when French rule, under Napoleon, began to impose the "Code Napoleon". The registration of births, marriages and deaths from then on became the responsibility of the local governments. Municipalities set up the Civil Registers for each of these events, and they have been used ever since. However, some priests continued to perform christenings and illegal marriage and burial rites. This had to be done surreptitiously until the 1802 "Concordaat".

The restrictions on the Church's activities under French rule was a backlash against religion sponsored by government. Instead of attending to their religious devotions, the citizens were expected to venerate 'reason' and to study the thoughts of Napoleon. Churches were closed, their bells were stilled, and Sundays abolished. Priests who performed illegal marriages involving men under 25 years of age were prosecuted. The quarter of Belgium's land that belonged to religious institutions was confiscated. Agricultural lands, buildings, woods, houses, abbeys and even some churches were sold. Most of the land was not acquired by the peasants but by middle-class landowners who rented their newly acquired lands to the peasants. Such peasants still remained in fact, if not in law, serfs who remained a sometimes exploited class like the "share croppers" in the United States and Canada.

There was a counter-backlash to this rule in 1798 in Flanders – the “Peasants’ War” (Boerenkrijg), which was a revolt of farm folk led by their priests against the French laws that restricted the activities of the Church and the conscription of young men who were considered 'minors' until the age of 25 years!

However, in 1802, a "Concordaat" was signed between Napoleon and the Pope reducing the restrictions on religion. One of its stipulations was that, as a compensation for their loss of income from the former "tithing" of the peasants' crops, the priests began to receive a wage from the government. Also, priests now could again perform legally the christening, marriage and burial rites beloved by the people.


Chapter 10 Education in Belgium André Van de Sompel has studied education in the village of Kalken a town about 15 km east of Ghent in East Flanders. Similar findings were reported in Buggenhout, East Flanders. From the 17th century until the French invasion at the end of the 1700s, there was a long period called the "Ancien Régime" during which Belgium was ruled by various states, ending with the Hapsburg (Habsburg) Austrian Empire under Maria Theresia and her son Josef II. As benevolent despots they brought in changes that resulted in prosperity in the Low Countries but some of Josef's innovations caused unrest in all social classes.

During that long era education was entrusted to the clergy with the cooperation of the municipal administration. At its beginning, education consisted merely of the recitation and explanation of the Catechism and, under the best of circumstances, occasionally the students might have learned a bit of reading and writing. (Such fortuitous opportunities have been suggested to explain why some poor children, although deprived of regular schooling, could sign their name. (In Flemish, 'to sign'= 'ondertekenen' is related to the verb 'tekenen'='to draw'. So a signature may indicate a semi-artistic achievement rather than true 'literacy'.)

Certain lay people, with the local clergy's permission, also could be instructors. Administrators of the parochial council could recruit (extra) teachers for the winters if needed. Such an interim lay teacher might be a weaver, a bricklayer or a cobbler! To help such volunteers, by 1836 a book with pages like the one below was in use to help children to learn to read letters. Towards the end of the "Ancien Régime" in about 90% of the parishes in the Diocese of Gent one or more schools operating in the above way. However in most of East Flanders in this period (1780 - 1800) not more than 50% of men and 20% of women were able to sign (onderteken) as parents, godparents or witnesses on church records of births, deaths,


marriages and on legal documents. This high illiteracy has been blamed on inadequate preparation of teachers, i.e. of teaching clergy as well as of lay teachers. Aggravating this was the frequent interruption of schooling because children were expected to help with work on the farm, especially during harvest time, and with cottage industries to mitigate the frequent family poverty. Also farm folk had little reason to be interested in education because it was not evident to them how it could improve their family's circumstances or their children's future. But perhaps most important was their inability to pay the fees expected for instruction. Right up to the end of this period the clergy remained firmly in control. For example a 1787 document (loosely translated) described the hiring of a schoolmistress: "Petronelle Livina Roels, born in this parish, an unmarried woman living with her mother in a good Christian style (is appointed) to teach young children up to the time of their First Communion to read and write, and to instruct them in religious matters in a public school, all provided the pastor agrees." Note that the range of instruction had expanded from that the beginning of that century when schooling was directed to religious matters. Following the French invasion in the early 1790s major changes occurred in education and literacy throughout the 'Southern Netherlands' (which eventually became Belgium) as a series of decrees and new laws came into effect between 1793 and 1808. These aimed at building an educational system in which its control by the Church was abolished. The clergy were required to swear to follow the French law but their verbal compliance was not always followed by changes in practice. So they were required to sign a written agreement to comply. Concurrently churches were closed and their possessions sold. (Since the Church had owned about 1/4 of the land, it might be thought that the sudden availability of so much land would benefit many farmers but this was so because it was bought up by the already affluent and combined into large private holdings that, much as before, employed the poorer farmers as near-serfs.) In principle, instruction in arithmetic, reading and writing and in "Napoleon's thoughts" was to be available free for all. But nearly all of these attempts at improvement failed. Thus the district administration did not have enough funds to pay the teachers' salaries so schools failed to stay open and the payment of special stipends for those who taught poor children were not forthcoming. So, in several communities individual citizens opened


private school and provided salaries for the teachers. But Frans Van de Zande an interprising teacher in Buggenhout, also in East Flanders, tried another way of increasing his income. By 1803, teaching occurred almost exclusively in the winters. The same year it was reported that the clergy were giving religious instruction surreptitiously. Following Napoleon's final defeat in 1815 there was an church-led movement, supported by the affluent, to restore the Ancien Régime under the Austrians but they refused. So the 'major powers' decided that the 'Southern Netherlands", later the become 'Belgium', should be joined to the 'Northern Netherlands" under its new king, Willem I. He attempted to improve primary education by requiring better teacher training, improved instruction methods and better school housing. The Church was to be allowed to participate as long as it accepted governmental control in educational matters. At first, there was little to be seen of a revival of primary education. During the winter months of 1817, in Kalken with a population of 6000, some 250 children attended the two municipal schools. But in the summer months 2/3 did not attend. The parents of between 22 and 40 children in era 1823- 1830 were unable to pay for instruction and this had to be funded by the municipality. Because of lack of funds the 'public' school system built up by the Dutch again collapsed as during the French hegemony. Only instruction of the most impoverished pupils was supported and the building of new schools and improvements in educational methods were abandoned. Requirements for specific training of teachers were no enforced and anyone could open a school. The most successful teacher, Ivo Vande Velde, taught the Flemish language, writing, arithmetic, elementary rhetoric, beginning history and geography, Christian doctrine and morality, and the French language. The other five teachers in Kalken instructed the same subjects but not history, geography and French. The teachers were relatively poorly paid. For example Ivo Vande Velde took in 295 Francs in 1841, of which 212 Francs came from the municipality. For comparison, farm workers (including farmers) had incomes in the range 270 to 435 Francs per year. Despite these problems, some country people learned enough so they, including Marcel's grandfather (born 1858) enjoyed reading. In 1842 the central government of the recently (1830) formed Kingdom of Belgium set out to reorganize primary education. It recognized the need for a comprise between the desires of the State and those of the Church. The municipalities on one hand were required to manage the primary schools, on the other hand the clergy could continue to teach if appointed by the municipal council. Other matters dealt with included the provision of free schooling for indigent children, the formal education of instructors., etc..


In 1879 open warfare, known as the "School Strife", between the State and the Church was brought on by a new law passed by a 'Liberal' majority government which confirmed the complete control of education by the state. As a result so-called 'free schools' organized by the Church to provide education with a religious content were no longer permitted. Religious instruction was removed from the official curriculum and textbooks had to be approved by a government committee. The municipal councils were to appointed only teachers who held a diploma from the 'Royal Normal School' for teacher training. Then, in 1884, a newly-elected Catholic government canceled the above law of 1879, returning the situation to where it was after the law of 1842 (see earlier). This to-and-fro battle continued until 1958. In the interval the Church continued to insist that education should conform to religious principles. To enforced its views it refused the Sacrements to those who taught in State schools and to parents who sent their children to such schools. It started many 'parish schools' and as a result of these various measures the State schools were almost deserted, especially in rural Flanders. All parties eventually tired of the strife and a compromise 'School Pact' was agreed upon in 1885. It granted the same State subsidy the all recognized schools, set the same salary for all qualified teachers. More State schools were set up in Flanders where they had 'faded' during the period of Catholic governments, free bussing to schools was provided and families now could send their children to their school of choice, whether Catholic or State sponsored, with penalty. There is little doubt that during the late 1800s one of the factors that encouraged emigration overseas to the United States and Canada was the apparent freedom from the 'Religious Strife" still rumbling at that time in Belgium. Indeed the Catholic church in Canada actively sought immigrants from Belgium to join their parishes and to settle in new parishes under its guidance and support on the nearly free, high-quality farming areas such as western Manitoba. In recent years society in Belgium has become more tolerant and more secular; also there is more cooperation between the public and Catholic school systems. Teachers from the clergy are becoming more rare. However people often continue to send their children to Catholic schools partially because of family tradition and possibly because they feel the quality of education is better there.

The Belgians Chapter 11— Page 1

Chapter 11 The Belgium Family The family was the basic unit of production and consumption in pre-industrial Northwestern Europe. Many of its features described below were inherited from the feudal Middle Ages through the "Ancien Regime" under the Habsburg monarchs, survived the French occupation and start to wane in Belgium only after the onset of the industrial revolution around 1830. The household mode of organization predominated on farms, in artisans' workshops and in small merchants' shops. This developed into what is known as the family economy. A household almost invariably consisted of a married couple, their children through their early teenage years, and the servants. Usually the household had only 5-6 members and more than two generations living together was unusual. High mortality and late marriages precluded extended families of three generations: grandparents rarely lived with their children and grandchildren. Children were an integral part of the household economy but in their early teens usually left to work in a household other than their own. An exception might be a child of an artisan who remained to acquire the valuable skills of his/her parent(s). In general, whether a child remained to work at home or went elsewhere depended on which way they could contribute most to the income of their own family. Sometimes when the family was on the edge of becoming destitute the children might be sent or allowed to work. Children often would be expected to work excessive hours and in dangerous situations. Young people would eventually leave home to marry and start an independent household of their own. The age of marriage was relatively late: over 26 years for men and for women over 23 years. After marriage they soon started a family of their own. It was not unusual for marriage to occur after a long courtship when the woman was already pregnant. The new family would soon employ a servant who, with their growing children, would contribute to whatever form of livelihood the household used to support itself. The term servant in this context was quite different from that describing a person who worked for a wealthier family, usually of a higher social class. In the usual rural family unit a servant was not necessarily of a lower class and ate and lived 'almost' as a family member. Being a servant as long as 10 years was a means of acquire skills, often not learnable at home, and to accumulate enough money to contribute to the establishment of a new household. Women usually contributed equally to this by adding a self-generated 'dowry'. This explained the prolonged court ships and delayed age of marriage common up into the 1800s.


As noted above, the family economy was the fundamental unit of production and consumption. People thought and worked in terms of sustaining the economic life of the family, and its members saw themselves as working together as interdependent rather than in an individualistic or independent manner. The goal of the household was to produce or earn through wages enough food and other necessities. Almost everyone lived within a household of some kind because it was almost impossible for ordinary people to support themselves independently. Such people, living outside a household, other than those in religious orders, were often suspected of living off criminal activities, or potentially becoming dependent on others. Within this type of subsistence economy all family members needed to work. On a farm much of the effort went into growing food and producing other agricultural products (flax, milk. butter, etc.) that could be exchanged for food. However few people had enough land to support the household from farming alone. In such families some members might work for wages elsewhere and send wages home. A father or older children might become migrant workers and leave their farm's work to be done by the mother and younger children. Surviving harvest failures (often every 3rd or 4th year) or economic slumps dictated no one could be idle. In Flanders, rural family income was supported by growing and processing flax into linen cloth. This cottage industry was exploited at various levels by merchants and other middlemen. It survived until the onset of the industrial revolution when spinning machines and steam-driven mechanical looms destroyed the profitability of the cottage industry. This and a succession of harvest failures brought poverty, epidemic disease and actual starvation to the region and was a major factor in encouraging emigration to North America. Women and the Family Economy

A woman's life was in large measure a function of her capacity to establish and maintain a household. For most women, except for those in religious orders, marriage was an economic necessity and fulfilled sexual and psychological needs. Her life was devoted first to supporting her parents' household economy and then to assuring that she had her own household in which to live. In most cases the bearing and raising children were less important than the first two goals.


By the age of seven she already did housework, fed the chickens, watered the animals and carried food and drink to those working in the fields. Once a girl's parents and brother could cope with the farm work her labor at home lost its value and she left home, usually between the age of 12 and 14 years, usually to work on another nearby farm. However, she would might migrate to a nearby own or city to living in another household as a servant. Her chief aim was to accumulate a dowry which allowed her to become and equal economic partner in a new household when she married. If her husband held enough farm land to support them, the wife would spend much of her time carrying things to her husband - water, food, seed, harvested grain and flax. To allow her to continue her contributions soon after giving birth, the newborn infants often would be placed with a wet nurse. Sometimes it might prove more profitable for her to work herself as a wet nurse in a nearby town or city. But if her husband became a migrate worker she would be in charge of the farm and undertake the plowing, planting and harvesting herself with the aid of her children. If an economic disaster such as the death of her husband struck a women might maintain family income by taking outside work, send other family members off to seek work or, as is well recorded, send them to beg in the streets. In the countryside, even though starvation might face the family, children were rarely abandoned but in the cities a surprising number of new born infants were brought anonymously to a Foundling Home. In all phases of life within the family economy women led active, even decisive roles.

Chapter 10 Village of Lembeke The village of Lembeke, in the province of Oost Vlaanderen, was incorporated into Kaprijke in 1976.


Chapter 12 Town of Maldegem Maldegem lies east of Moerkerke and Den Hoorn, and is the largest municipality in size in East-Flanders. Until the 13th century, Maldegem's territory consisted mainly of swamps and woods. From the 14th century onward, annual fairs have taken place here, a privilege given to the village by Count Louis of Male (see Male). The manor Maldegem stood under the authority of 'het Brugse Vrije'. Maldegem is often called 'the faithful'. The community owes its good name to the bravery and loyalty of its knights of the Count of Flanders. Philips of Maldegem fought on the side of Guy of Dampierre against Filips (the king of France), was captured and his castle was burnt down. Walter of Maldegem accompanied the Count when he was captured by the French. Nevertheless, not all the knights were loyal. Eustache of Maldegem chose the side of the French! Eventually he saw that he was wrong and fought on the Flemish side at Groeningefield (Battle of the Golden Spurs 1302). The municipal hall stands centrally on the market square. This building was erected between 1907 and 1909. In the tower hangs a carillon with 18 bells. Beside the little river "Eede" lies St.-Anna Park. The house at the entrance of this park is called the castle of St.-Anna. In the 13th century, this building served as a hospital. The church of St.-Barbara was built in 1074. The tower dates back to the 11th century, and the choir to the 15th century. The building was destroyed in 1578 and rebuilt in 1778-1779. On the right hand side of the small road that leads to the church stands the old "Schepenhuis" (house of magistrates), which was built in 1525. A pillory was located in front of this house. A small 16th century castle still stands not far from the church, and is called "Het Kasteeltje". Reesinghe Castle is situated just outside the center of the town. The present manor was built in 1858 at the same location as the stronghold of the lords of Maldegem, which was a ruin at that time. There was a fortified farm built on a small hill, surrounded by a wall, and after some time, the farm became a genuine castle. Maldegem's most famous attraction is the Steamcenter. This center consists of a tourist railway, Maldegem-Eeklo, a small track Maldegem-Donk, and the station at Maldegem. In that station, built in 1862, you can admire the old steam train, steam rollers, etc.


Chapter 13 The Early Boerjan Family

Generation I Joannes, married to Theresia Coreman. The last name of Joannes is not known. Only at the birth of his 1st child is the name “Briant” written in his baptism book; by his 2nd child, “Broyan”; by his 3rd child, “Brejan”; and by his 4th child, “Bruhans”. From this marriage came:

1. Martina Briant, born at Maldegem on June 21, 1648, married at Maldegem on April 27, 1673 to Martinus Bollaert.

2. Hubertus Broyan,

born at Maldegem on March 10, 1650 died at Maldegem on May 5, 1700 married Magdalena de Jaegere, who died at Maldegem on July 5,

1685.

3. Cornelia Brejan, born at Maldegem on January 21, 1652, died at Maldegem on March 10, 1728, married to Judocus Depaepe, who died before 1728.

4. Jacobus Bruhans (at the time of his first marriage was written

Bourjan, and at the time of his first wife’s death on May 31, 1701). The name was written Bruan after his second marriage on August 1, 1701. He was born at Maldegem on September 21, 1653


Generation 2 Jacobus Bruhans (at his first marriage was written Bourjan, and at the time of death of his first wife on May 31, 1701. The name was written Bruan after his second marriage on August 1, 1701.) He was born at Maldegem on September 21, 1653. He was married first at Maldegem on June 24, 1696 to Cornelia Pickelbeen, who died at Maldegem on May 31, 1701. From this marriage came: 1. Petrus Bourjans (with his marriage in 1719 came the commonly used name

“Bruan”). He was born at Maldegem on June 29, 1697. He died on June 15 and was buried on June 17, 1750, at St. Kruis. He married Joanna Gilleman, who died on January 14, 1729 at St. Kruis. Four children were born of this marriage. He married Godelieve Govaert on February 27, 1729, at St. Kruis. She died on Sept. 24, 1777 at St. Kruis. There were 7 children born of this marriage.

2. Judocus Bourian (at his death came the name “Bruan”), born at Maldegem

June 6, 1699, died at Maldegem on June 8, 1699. TWINS...? 3. Cornelis Bourian, born at Maldegem on June 6, 1699, died at Maldegem on

June 8, 1699. Jacobus married for a second time at Maldegem on August 1, 1701 to Wilhelmina van Ootteghem, who died at Maldegem on December 22, 1715. From this marriage came:

1. Joannes Bruan (with his marriage the name “Boerejans” was used). He was born at Maldegem on December 29, 1702 and died at Maldegem on November 21, 1758. (direct ancestor - see Generation 3.)

2. Elisabeth Bruan, born at Maldegem on April 10, 1706. 3. Joanna Bruan (Boerjan the registered name at death). Born at Maldegem on

October 24, 1708, baptized at Maldegem, died at Maldegem on October 31, 1708.

From the above-located research, there is a diverse variety in the last name. Within this family were used the names Bruhans, Bourjan, Bruan, Bourjans, Bourian and Boerjan.


Generation 3 Joannes Bruan (at his marriage the name “Boerejans” was used) (son of IIb). - born at Maldegem on December 29, 1702 - died at Maldegem on November 21, 1758

- married for a time at Maldegem on April 13, 1728 to Maria Anne de Vrieze, who was born about 1705, and died at Maldegem on June 28, 1757.

From this marriage came: 1. Anna Maria Boerjan, born at Maldegem on January 12, 1729, died at Maldegem on March 23, 1729, at 2 months, 11 days old. 2. Petronella Barbara Boerjan (at her death the name “Boerian” was used in

the register). born at Maldegem on March 18, 1730, died at Maldegem on May 6, 1736, at 6 years of age. 3. Maria Francisca Boerjan, born at Maldegem on March 2, 1733. 4. Clara Boerjan, born at Maldegem on January 16, 1736 died at Maldegem on July 14, 1756 at 20 years of age. 5. Pieter Boerejans, (direct ancestor - see Generation 4) born at Maldegem on February 20, 1738 died at Lembeke on January 7, 1818 at 80. 6. Joanna Boerjan, born at Maldegem on October 31, 1740 married to Georgius Kockuijt


Generation 3 (Cont’d) 7. Joseph Boerjan, born at Maldegem on March 3, 1743, died at Lembeke on March 15, 1817, married for a time at Bassevelde on April 30, 1774 to Anna Maria de Koningh,

who was born at Bassevelde and died at Bassevelde on January 27, 1808, married a second time at Lembeke on September 10, 1810 to Petronella

Isabella Soens, who was born at Waarschoot on April 21, 1764, and died at Lembeke on August 4, 1811 at 47.

Note: In the civil service register, it stated that Petronella Soens married

Joseph on September 15, 1808, and that she was the widow of Ferdinant Van Belle, who died at Lembeke.

8. Regina Barbara Boerjan, born at Maldegem on December 13, 1745 died at Maldegem on April 28, 1748 at 3 years, 4 months. 9. Petronilla Cornelia Boerjan, born at Maldegem on February 18, 1749, no known occupation* died at Maldegem on June 21, 1753 at 4 years, 4 months. * no known occupation on register usually indicates the person

died as a child 10. Isabella Clara Boerjan born at Maldegem on August 6, 1752 died at Kaprijke on November 26, 1819, at 67 years of age, married first to Petrus van de Wijnckel, married secondly to Josephus Haudor, married a third time at Kaprijke, July 17, 1798, to Petrus Deroose who

was born at Ichtegem ca 1762 and died at Kaprijke on March 1, 1814.


Generation 3 (Cont’d) Joannes Bruan married a second time at Maldegem on June 25, 1758 to

Joanna Verbeke. Na zijn eerste huwelijk blijft Joannes een jaar weduwnaar. Op 25 juni

1758 trouwt hij voor de 2e maal. Dit huwelijk duurt slechts 6 maanden, want dan sterft Joannes en zijn 2e vrouw blijft achter met 5 minderjarige kinderen uit het 1e hewelijk, resp. 6, 9, 15, 18 en 20 jaar oud.

Approximate translation: After his first marriage Joannes has been widowed for one year. On

June 25, 1758, he married for a 2nd time. This marriage lasted 6 months, and then Joannes died. His 2nd wife was left with 5 underage children after their marriage, resp. 6, 9, 15, 18 and 20 years old.

1795 -FORMER AUSTRIAN NETHERLANDS ANNEXED TO FRANCE


Generation 4 IVb Pieter Boerejans (son of IIIb) born at Maldegem on February 20, 1738 died at Lembeke on January 7, 1818 at 80 years of age. married for a time at Lembeke on May 1, 1773 to Angela Switsinck, who

was baptized at Lembeke on September 27, 1752, and died at Lembeke on October 13, 1804. Pieter was 35 and Angela was 21. Interesting note: she was 8 months pregnant at the time of her marriage.

From this marriage came: 1. Petronella Boerejan, born at Lembeke at July 9, 1773 died at Bassevelde on December 10, 1851 married to Georgius Bauwens, who died on August 25 and was buried on August 27, 1826, at Bassevelde. 2. Isabella Boerjans, born at Lembeke on November 7, 1774 married at Kaprijke January 10, 1801 to Jacob de Decker, who was born at

Kaprijke on September 1, 1780, day labourer. 3. Petrus Franciscus Boerejan, born at Lembeke on August 11, 1776, died at Lembeke on August 31, 1780 at 4 years of age. 4. Joannes Boerejan, born at Lembeke on January 19, 1778 Op 28 augustus 1846, om 9 uur ‘s-avonds, is in de woning van Bernard Taets, Beekstraat te Lembeke, overleden Joseph Boerjan, 60 jaar ongehuwd en zoon van Pieter Boerjan en Livina Coppens. Deze Joseph zou dus ca 1786 geboren moeten zijn. Maar Pieter is pas in een 2e huwelijk in 1804 met Livina Coppens getrouwd. Vermoedelijk is dit het overlijden van Joannes Boerjan geboren 19 january 1778 uit het 1e huwelijk van Pieter met Angela Switsinck.


Generation 4 (Cont’d) On August 28, 1846, about 9 o’clock in the evening, has in the abode of Bernard Taets, Beekstraat at Lembeke, died at Lembeke, Joseph Boerjan, 60 years unmarried and son of Pieter Boerjan and Livina Coppens. This Joseph zou in that way circa 1786 born formed to be. Only Pieter is hardly in just 2nd marriage in 1804 with Livina Coppens married. Vermoedelijk is this the death of Joannes Boerjan born on January 19, 1778 out of this 2nd marriage of Pieter with Angela Switsinck.

5. Franciscus Boerejan, (direct ancestor – see Generation 5)

born at Lembeke on March 11, 1780, died at Lembeke on April 5, 1839 at 59. married:

(1) Anne Petronella Finet at Lembeke July 30, 1808. She was 38 and he was 28. She was born at Lembeke on June 18, 1770 and died there on Sept. 25, 1808 (married for only 2 months at time of death).

(2) Maria Judoca Van Cauter on October 13, 1809 at Lembeke. She was 23 and he was 29. She was baptized at Lembeke on July 30, 1786, and died there on Nov. 30, 1867. Marie and Franciscus had 9 children.

When Franciscus married Anne Finet, she was the widow of Andre Deltour. The marriage of Franciscus (Francies) and Anne last only 57 days, when Anne died. At the Correctional Tribunal at Ghent, Francies was sentenced on January 22, 1830 to 3 months in prison for theft. On the same day, his daughter, Marie Therese, was also sentenced to 14 days in prison, for theft. Francies served his sentence from April 24, 1830 to July 24, 1830 and Marie served her sentence from April 24, 1830 to May 3, 1830. 6. Bernardus Boerjan, born at Lembeke on September 4, 1782, labourer died at Kaprijke on April 4, 1821 married at Hoofdplaat December 12, 1814 to Anna Catharina

Foossens, who was born at Kilsdonk ca 1771, and died at Kaprijke on March 19, 1821.


Generation 4 (Cont’d) Het heeft Bermar veel moeite gekost om te kunnen trouwen. Het huwelijk heeft plaatsgevonden te Hoofdplaat en niet in Yzendijke waar Bernardus toen woonde. Eeen en ander blijkt uit onderstannde brief. “Mijn Heer d’Heer Burge meester toi Hoofdplaat. Mijn Heer brengen dezes Bernard Boerjan zoude gaarne trouwen, hij loopt sedert een jaar om zulks hier gedaan te krijgen dog het heeft nog niet konnen lukken om reden hij den doodbrief van zijne aanstaande vrouwsmoeder niet heeft, of kan dat het Caphiel op het een of ander van zijn papieren niet staat, het is maar een niets beduijdende kleynigheid die er aan mankeert, en ik zoude hem gerust daarvan trouwen, dog gij weet onze burgemeester is op dat stuk zeer moeyelijk. Zoo gij dat konde besluyten om die wens hen te trouwen, mits zij betalen, zie ik er geen den minste zwarigheid in, en ik zal zoo gij wilt de publicatie van ondertrouw hier doen, schoon dat ook al niet nodig is. Yzend; 7 november 1814 EU Dienaar

A. Faro”

7. Ignatius Boerejan, born at Lembeke on January 8, 1785, died at Lembeke on June 8, 1786 at 1-1/2 years. 8. Petrus Boerejan, born at Lembeke on February 23, 1787, married at Zuidzande on Nov. 4, 1817 to Collette Gilles, spinster. 9. Carolus Bourjan, born at Lembeke on January 26, 1789


Generation 4 (Cont’d) 10. Georgius Boerejan, born at Lembeke on May 2, 1791, died at Ichtegem Jan. 29, 1867. married:

(1) Anna Therese Ioye at Ichtegem Dec. 28, 1816; she was born Sept. 12, 1795, spinster, at Torhout, died at Ichtegem on October 10, 1833. They had 7 children.

(2) Regina Geneveva Turloot at Ichtegem on Jan. 25, 1834; she was born at Ichtegem on Sept. 16, 1802, spinster, died at Ichtegem on Oct. 9, 1859. They had 5 children.

11. Maria Johanna Boerejan,

born at Lembeke on December 21, 1794 died at Bassevelde January 17, 1884 married at Boekhoute on February 16, 1826 to Joseph Anjun, who was born at Selsaete on July 30, 1786, and died at Bassevelde on June 21, 1864.

Joseph Anjun was eerst gehuwd geweest met Joanna Marie de Vleeschauwer, die op 17 oktober 1825 te Boekhoute is overleden.


Generation 4 (Cont’d) Pieter Boerejans (IVb) married a second time at Bassevelde on December 11, 1805 to Livina M. Coppens, baptized in Lembeke on August 1, 1767, and died at Lembeke on April 30, 1840 From this marriage came: 1. Marie Therese Boerejan, born at Lembeke on November 25, 1806, no occupation, died at Lembeke on December 25, 1806 at 1 month of age. 2. Jan Baptiste Boerejan, born at Lembeke on July 25, 1808, died at Lembeke on March 13, 1857, married at Lembeke on August 29, 1832 to Marie Colete

Pauwels, who was born at Kaprijke on July 7, 1806, and died at Lembeke on May 28, 1863. Marie had 13 births and only 1 living son, Angelus. Bruno lived 10 months, Joannes Baptiste lived ½ day, 4 stillborn sons and 2 stillborn daughters were born, Marie Terese lived only 2 days, Julie lived 1 day, Amelia died at 2 months, and Jacobus died at 2 months, 20 days.

Van 29 october 1835 tot en met 28 november heeft Jan in de gevangenis te Gent doorgebracht. Hiertoe was hij veroordeeld, wegens diefstal, door het Correctioneel Trubinaal te Gent op juni 1835. Jan was 1.71 m lang, had een grote neus en blauwe ogen.

1830 - BELGIUM DECLARES INDEPENDENCE. KINGDOM OF BELGIUM FORMED

AS A CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY.


Generation 5 Vb Franciscus Boerejan (son of IVb) born at Lembeke on March 11, 1780 died at Lembeke on April 5, 1839

married for a time at Lembeke on July 30, 1808 to Anne Petronella Finet,

who was born at Lembeke on June 18, 1770 and died at Lembeke on September 25, 1808.

married a second time at Lembeke on October 13, 1809 to Marie Judoca Van Cauter, who was baptized in Lembeke on July 30, 1786, and died at Lembeke on November 30, 1867.

From this marriage came: 1. Marie Therese Bourjan born at Lembeke on July 15, 1811 died at Lembeke on May 12, 1880. Child: Petrus Boerjan, born and died Dec. 23, 1840 at Lembeke. Marie married Pieter Francis Hontele on December 1, 1876. He was born

at Assenede on September 27, 1814 and died at Boekhoute on May 18, 1891. Marie had her child Petrus at age 29, married Pieter at age 65, and died at age 69. She must have led a hard life because she was imprisoned for theft in 1830 for 14 days, incidentally at the same time as her father, who was impisoned for 3 months. In those days, a person was sometimes forced to steal food to feed their families or themselves.

2. Marie Francoise Boerejans, born at Lembeke on July 7, 1813 died at Bassevelde, February 28, 1862, married to Livinus van Heesvelde, who was born at Oost Eeclo on May 3, 1814, laborer


Generation 5 (Cont’d) 3. Joannes Boerejans, born at Lembeke on September 15, 1816, died at Gent on October 8, 1902, married Rosalia Van De Kerkhove at Lembeke on May 22, 1846. She was

born at Lembeke on August 12, 1824, and died at St. Nicolaas on April 16, 1894. They had one child, Eduardus Boerjan, born at Lembeke on December 1, 1846, and died at Lembeke on June 6, 1847, at 1-1/2 years.

Bij een vonnis van de rechtbank te Gent van 5 december 1838 is Joannes veroordeeld tot een gevangenisstraf van een jaar en een dag. In het gevangenis register is vermeld: “Betigt van diefte van een verken”. Zijn signalement was; lang 1.66 m; blauwe ogen; gewoon gezicht. Hij is op 28 januari 1839 opgenomen in het arrestantenhuis te Gent en op 24 februari 1839 overgebracht naar het gevang St. Bernard. Toen Joannes trouwde heeft hij hiervoor toestemming gekregen van de colonel-commandant van het le regiment Linie, waar hij als remplancant voor de lichting 1840 was. 4. Sophie Boerejans born at Lembeke on January 17, 1819 died at Lembeke on March 25, 1858 married at Lembeke on May 20, 1842 to Angelus Depape who was born at

Lembeke on December 9, 1811, laborer, who died at Lembeke on February 15, 1881.

5. Naamloos Boerjan, born at Lembeke on June 4, 1821 died at Lembeke on June 4, 1821 This child is alleen ingeschreven in het overlijdensregister en niet in het geboorte register. In het overlijdensregister is vermeld “het kind heeft slechts enkele minuten geleefd” zonder vermelding van een voornaam. This child is recorded in the death register and no longer in the birth register. In this death register is written “this child ….


Generation 5 (Cont’d) 6. Joannes Baptiste Bourjans, born at Lembeke on April 7, 1823 died at Oost Eeclo February 27, 1864 married Amelia Geiregat at Bassevelde on April 17, 1861. She was born

at Bassevelde on February 23, 1835 and died on November 18, 1865. They had one child, Joannes Baptiste Boerjan, born at Oost Eeclo on August 30, 1861.

Joannes’ second wife was Joannes B. Backe. Bij het huwelijk wordt de achternaam geschreven “Boerjans”. Nadat Joannes Bourjans op 27 februari 1864 overleden is, trouwt Amelia Geiregat, op 18 november 1865, voor een 2e huwelijk met Joannes B. Backe. 7. Desire Boerjans (direct ancestor - see Generation 6) born at Lembeke on May 23, 1826 died at Lembeke on May 22, 1894 8. Catharina Bourjan, born at Lembeke on August 15, 1829, no occupation died at Lembeke on January 12, 1835 at 6 years of age. 9. Petrus Francies Boerjan, born at Lembeke on July 1, 1833, died at Hoboken, Belgium on April 22, 1920, married:

1 Helena Van Hijfte on Feb. 4, 1856 at Oost Eeclo. She was born at Oost Eeclo on June 21, 1834 and died there on Dec. 2, 1866. They had 3 children.

2 Antonia Hollevoet at Zelzaete, Belgium, on Feb. 28, 1867. She was born at Zelzaete on April 10, 1840, and died at Hoboken on December 29, 1915. They had 7 children who lived. Their first child was stillborn.


Generation 6 VIi Desire Boerjans (son of Vb) – GREATGRANDFATHER OF ANITA BOERJAN born at Lembeke on May 23, 1826 died at Lembeke on May 22, 1894 at 68

married in Lembeke on August 13, 1853 to Sophia Taets, who was born at Lembeke on February 9, 1832 and died at Lembeke on July 9, 1909 at 77. Widowed for 15 years. “Desire was also in jail. In 1864, he was there for 1 month and 8 days for marauding. We know now that he was 1.7 metres tall, had blue eyes, a long face, a normal nose, and fair hair.”

From this marriage came:

1. Leopold Boerjans born at Lembeke on April 18, 1854

2. Rosalie Boerjans born at Lembeke on December 22, 1856 died at Lembeke on January 29, 1858 at 2 years.

3. Benjamin Boerjans born at Lembeke on April 22, 1859, died at Lembeke on March 26, 1864 at 4 years, 11 months. 4. Angelus Boerjans born at Lembeke at March 4, 1861 died at Saskatoon, Sask., Canada on June 4, 1917 at 56. Angelus is evenals zijn broers Peter en Bernardus naar Amerika geemigreerd. In America, was hij bekend onde naam Lus Boerjan. Hij is nooit gehuwd geweest en heeft een tijd alleen door America rond getrokken. Toen Peter en Bernardus zich in Saskatoon gevestigd hadden, is hij er ook heen getrokken en is eveneens een boerderij begonnen. Bij zijn overlijden in 1917, liet hig zijn bezittingen na aan Peter. Bernardus, aan zijn zuster in Belgie, die gehuwd was met Camiel Bierens en aan een nicht Leonie Roelant.


Generation 6 (Cont’d) 5. Petrus Boerjans, born at Lembeke on December 17, 1863 died at Seattle, Washington, October 1940 at 77. 6. Rosalie Boerjans, born at Lembeke on July 23, 1866 died at Assenede, November 3, 1896 at 30 years of age. 7. Marie Leonie Boerjans, born at Lembeke on October 25, 1867,

married at Lembeke on May 18, 1892 to Hippolijte Roelandts, who was born at Aveghem on November 29, 1861

8. Bernardus Boerjans, (direct ancestor - see Gen. 8)

born at Lembeke on April 16, 1870 (see VIIh.)

Grandfather to Anita Boerjan Olson Treinen 9. Maria Celina Boerjans, born at Lembeke on October 5, 1873 died at Waarschoot, August 5, 1948 at 75 10. Elodia Maria Boerejans, born at Lembeke on October 18, 1874, died at Lembeke on December 8, 1874 at 2 months of age. 11. Augustus Boerjans, born at Lembeke on February 6, 1876 died at Lembeke on October 4, 1876 at 8 months of age. 12. Elodia Boerjans, born at Lembeke on February 13, 1878 died at Brugge in May 1900 at 22.


Generation 7

Children of Desire Boerjan and Sophia Taets

Anita’s greatgrandparents Angelus Boerjans born at Lembeke at March 4, 1861 died at Saskatoon, Sask., Canada on June 4, 1917 at 56. VIIf Petrus Boerjans born at Lembeke December 17, 1863 died at Seattle, Washington, October 1940 married to Virginia van de Avoy, who was born at Yzendijke May 29, 1870 and died at Seattle, Washington, November 25, 1957 From this marriage came:

1. Mary Lucille Boerjan, born Jan. 17, 1901, married Seattle, Wash. January 14, 1920, to James Clarke

2. Theophile Boerjan, born 1903 (architect). Married Irene Dines and had

one child, Virginia Boerjan. VIIg Rosalie Boerjans born at Lembeke on July 23, 1866 died at Assenede, November 3, 1896 at 30 She had a son, Augustus, on December 2, 1887, before she was married.

When she married, she changed her son’s last name to her husband’s name - Neyt. Her husband was Emimilius Neyt. He was born at Assenede, Belgium, on January 22, 1866 and died on November 3, 1896 at 30, coincidentally, he died the same day as his wife died.

VIIh Bernardus Boerjans (direct ancestor - see Generation 8) born at Lembeke, April 16, 1870, farmer died at June 16, 1957 at 87, Elrose, Saskatchewan, married on August 12, 1893 to Nathalie Schalenz, who was born at

Oost Eeclo on July 28, 1870 and died at Elrose March 15, 1956 at 86


Generation 7 (Cont’d) VIIi Maria Celina Boerjans (daugther of VIi) born at Lembeke on October 5, 1873 died at Waarschoot, August 5, 1948 at 75 She had the following two children before she was married: - Aloysius Boerjan, born at Lembeke on April 22, 1892 died at Lembeke on August 13, 1894 at 2 years - Raymond Boerjan born at Oost Eeclo on May 14, 1894 Marie eventually married Camiele Bierens. VIIj Elodia Boerjans (daughter of VIi) born at Lembeke on February 13, 1878 died at Brugge in May 1900 (in childbirth?) at 22 Children: - Martha Maria Boerjans, born at Brugge on May 5, 1900 died at Lembeke on June 16, 1900 at 1 month.


Generation 8 (Children of Bernardus Boerjan and Nathalie Schalenz) 1. William Boerjan born Chicago, Illinois, prior to 1895 died at birth (WAITING FOR DEATH CERTIFICATE) 2. William H. Boerjan born at Kewanee, Illinois, on August 8, 1896, died in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, August 19, 1981, married to Valerie Boucher on July 12, 1919. She was born on

January 21, 1900 in Crookston, Minnesota, and died in Rosetown, Saskatchewan on October 12, 1995. They had three children: Anita Marie, Blanche Beatrice, and Viola Marguerite.

3. Theophile Boerjan born at Kewanee, Illinois, on June 4, 1898 registered as born to Benjamin and Nellie Schalens (Birth certificate received) died at Elrose in February 1966. 4. Joseph Boerjan (Jay Raymond) born at Oakwood, North Dakota on March 21, 1904 died at Pasco, Washington in September 1987. (Received birth certificate Oct. 13/99) 5. Marguerite Boerjan born St. Boniface, Manitoba (CANNOT OBTAIN BIRTH CERTIFICATE- Manitoba won’t release birth certificate without permission of next of kin) died in approximately 1978.


Generation 9 (Children of William Boerjan and Valerie Boucher) 1. Anita Marie Boerjan born in Crookston, Minnesota, on February 28, 1919, married to Earl Olson on July 19, 1942. Earl Olson born December 31, 1909, in Brownlee, Saskatchewan, and died in Elrose on July 14, 1966. Children: Daughter, born Victoriaville, Quebec Daughter, born Elrose, Saskatchewan Daughter, born Elrose, Saskatchewan Son, born Elrose, Saskatchewan Son and Daughter, born Elrose, Saskatchewan Daughter, Elrose, Saskatchewan. 2. Blanche Beatrice Boerjan born in Elrose, Saskatchewan, on April 30, 1920. Married to Carl McCallum on January 13, 1943. Died in Elrose in December 1989. Two children: Son, born Elrose, Saskatchewan Daughter, born Elrose, Saskatchewan 3. Viola Boerjan born in Elrose, Saskatchewan, on November 23, 1923, married Donald (Mac) McDonald in Sept. 1944, died in Vancouver, British Columbia, September 17, 1957. Three children: Daughter Daughter, born in Vancouver, B.C. Daughter, born in Vancouver, B.C.


Chapter 14 Nathalie Schalenz (Gaelens) Nathalie Schalenz (born Nathalie Gaelens) was born at Oost Eeclo, Belgium, on July 27, 1870, with her birth being registered by her father on July 28, 1870. She married Bernhardus (Ben) Boerjans, who was born at Lembeke, Belgium, on April 16, 1870. Nathalie’s father was Eduard Gaelens and her mother was Virginie Hollebosch. They were married on August 12, 1864, at 17:00 hours in the afternoon, and they lived on Stroomstraete, Oost-Eecloo, at the time of Nathalie’s birth. Eduard was born on August 23, 1836, at Oost-Eecloo, Belgium. His father was Pieter Franciest Gaelens, born 1780, who was a labourer. His mother was Marie Theresia van Hoecke, born 1773, and she was also a labourer. Virginie Hollebosch was born on October 19, 1843, and she was a field worker. Her father was Livinus Hollebosch, and he died at Oost Eecloo on August 23, 1857. Her mother was Livinne Marie Lippens, born 1776, who was a small farmer.


Chapter 15 – Bernardus (Ben) Boerjan

Ben was born Bernardus Boerjans on born at Lembeke, Belgium, on April 16, 1870. His father was Desire Boerjans, who was born at Lembeke on May 23, 1826, and who died at Lembeke on May 22, 1894. His mother was Sophia Taets, who was born at Lembeke on February 9, 1832, and who died at Lembeke on July 9, 1909. Desire had been in jail for 1 month and 8 days for marauding. He was 1.7 metres tall, had blue eyes, a long face, normal nose, and fair hair.

Desire Boerjan, Sophia Taets


Chapter 16 - Life Together for Nathalie and Ben Nathalie and Ben met in Belgium. Not too much is known about their courting years. They became engaged to be married, and Ben travelled to the United States with his two brothers, Petrus and Angelus (Pete and Lus) and perhaps a cousin. The young men settled in Chicago, where there was a good-sized Belgium community, and Ben worked to save enough money to send for Nathalie. The reason for emigration to the United States was two-fold. The opportunities for young families in America were seen as being too good to pass up. Ben and his brothers and cousin had heard all the stories about opportunities in the New World. In the late 19th century, the governments of Canada and the United States wished to encourage the immigration of good farmers from Europe, so they sent communications all over Europe offering the people there the possibility of owning land for free! This was a dream come true for many Europeans as land was not readily available in Europe. Another reason for emigration was that the parents of these young men wished them to avoid the draft. In Europe, due to the number of wars over the years, many countries had compulsory conscription in the Armed Forces. Many young men from every country in Europe made the journey to America to avoid the draft in their home countries, and made good lives for themselves and their families in North America. Ben promised Nathalie that as soon as he had saved enough money, he would send for her, which he did. The oral records indicate that they were married at Davenport, Iowa, U.S.A. (right on the Iowa/Illinois border), on August 12, 1893, and stayed with friends there for a while. They also lived in Chicago, Illinois. Shortly after their marriage, Nathalie became pregnant with their first child. They named him William. Due to the attending physician’s drunken incompetence, the baby died at birth. Nathalie said it was because the doctor used forceps and crushed the baby’s skull. Nathalie was affected by this for the remainder of her life. However, she was not superstitious, and when she became pregnant again and had a son, she named him William. The family moved to Kewanee, Illinois, where Ben was employed in an iron foundry and Nathalie ran a boarding house, which she was very successful at. William was born on August 8, 1896, and his brother, Theophile (Tayfield), was born on June 4, 1898. With Ben’s earnings and Nathalie’s income from the boarding house, they were able to save quite a lot of money.


Of Interest: The church that registered William and Tay’s birth, and where their birth certificates were filed, burned down and the records were lost. Later, when Bill and Tay went to the U.S. for a copy of their birth certificate, they had a difficult time getting copies, which they needed in order to receive Canada Pension and Old Age Pension in Canada. They had a certification prepared by the appropriate U.S. government department, which was sworn to by Ben Boerjan, their father, stating when and where they had been born. While living in Kewanee, Ben was injured at work and had to leave his job for awhile. Nathalie suggested they move back to Belgium while they still had some money. This they did, however, they were not very happy there as they were too rich for the poor and too poor for the richthere was no middle class in Belgium at that time. Ben wasn’t as unhappy as Nathalie because he could always go to the local pub to meet his friends, but Nathalie was very lonely. They made the decision to move back to the United States. Nathalie became pregnant while in Belgium, but sadly lost the baby on the trip back to the United States. The family travelled to the U.S. on board the Kensington from Antwerp in January 1901, and entered New York through Ellis Island. As they were considered citizens of the United States, having lived there before, they did not go through the stringent emigration procedures that were required of people immigrating to the United States for the first time. After arriving back in the United States, Nathalie decided that, as she and Ben had made the decision to make North America their home, she should learn to speak English. Prior to this, she didn’t have the incentive to learn English as she had always thought they would return to Belgium to live. Nathalie went to night school to learn English, learned to sign her name, and began to learn to read. Ben, always searching for opportunities, found some land to homestead in North Dakota, so the family moved to a location near Oakwood. Their son, Jay Raymond (Joe), was born there on March 21, 1904. His birth certificate states he was “born at Oakwood, Grand Forks County, North Dakota - father’s name: Ben Boerjan, mother’s name: Nellie Schaelens”. There were many homesteads surrounding Ben’s land which were owned by Germans. Bill and Tay went to a school run by Catholic brothers, and German was the only language spoken there. As the boys spoke only Belgian (probably Flemish), they couldn’t communicate very well, and “often got a switch on their behinds”. At that time, Germans did not like people from Belgium for some reason, and Ben felt his neighbours picked on him. He also wanted to acquire enough land for himself and his sons, and, as he was


surrounded by Germans, he knew this would be impossible. Thus, Ben and his brother, Petrus (Pete), decided it was time to move again, this time to Canada. Bill and Tay were especially happy about the move, as they did not like school in North Dakota, for apparent reasons. They moved to St. Boniface, Manitoba, where Nathalie gave birth to a daughter, Marguerite, in 1907. Ben worked on an ice wagon, which wasn’t too healthy for his bowels; he later required surgery (probably from sitting on the ice blocks). As Ben was a farmer at heart, he watched the papers continually for an opportunity to homestead some land. At the earliest opportunity, they moved to Lanigan, Saskatchewan, in 1906. In Saskatchewan, for a registration fee of $10.00, any male over 18 or any widow who was sole head of a family could have a quarter section (160 acres) of land from the federal government (the “Crown”). To transfer title of land from the Crown to the homesteader, the land would have to be “proved up”. The farmer had to have broken at least 30 acres of land and must have built on the land a residence worth at least $300 in which he had resided at least 6 months of each of three consecutive years. He must be a British subject either by birth or naturalization. Once all these conditions were met, the title was transferred and registered in the homesteader’s name at the Land Titles Office. The land around Lanigan was a quiet, peaceful land. It was a land of rolling grasses fringed with green poplar bluffs, abounding in wildlife, such as antelope, deer, prairie chicken, and bush partridge. It was part of the Saskatchewan Valley, bounded on the south by Last Mountain Lake, on the east by Big Quill Lake, and on the west by the Little Manitou. The land differed from the open plains of the Palliser triangle. It was dotted with many depressions which held the spring run-off. In many of these, there were small clumps of poplar which had been protected from fires by wet ground and by the lush green growth always found in such locations. This same unevenness of land, and abundance of moisture, accounted for a variety of grasses and a great quantity of feed for grazing animals. The buffalo were long gone, although there was evidence of their existence in this area. The prairies were strewn with bleached buffalo bones, and the land was crisscrossed with narrow crooked paths connecting the more dependable water holes. At intervals, there were wallows and salt licks where the grass had long since ceased to grow and where the ground was as hard packed as the modern city streets. Here was an ideal site where the North American Indian could hunt and live. There was food and water at hand, meat easily secured to feed their families, and in the bluffs protection from the winter storms and hot summer sun. The Indians have left much


evidence of their existence in what was once their camping sites - arrowheads, heavy stone hammers, and chunks of dark grey pemmican marked their sojourn in this land. The following is an excerpt from “Lanigan, 1905-1955: Saskatchewan’s Golden Jubilee”.

“There is one homesteader on the very town-site itself about whom we must tell. In the spring of 1906 Ben Boerjan and his family settled on the south-west quarter of Section 22. He tells of building a sod house and barn, and of the leaky roof characteristic of such abodes. Mr. Boerjan was Lanigan’s first milkman, supplying milk (22 quarts for a dollar) to the town during the years 1907 to 1910. At that time, he sold his land to Mr. Griffith. This quarter was surveyed for town lots, but when it was learned that the town would not extend that far south, it became the locale for the Lanigan Golf Club.”

Ben and his sons, Bill and Tay, cleared the right-of-way for the railroad where Lanigan is now situated while at the same time carrying on the dairy business. Ben always thought he wouldn’t survive past the age of 35. With this in mind, he taught Bill from a young age how to take care of his mother and siblings. He also taught all his boys the Belgium work ethic, which stood them in good stead throughout their lives. Bill remembered well those days and the soddy they had lived in, even though he was very young. The first thought many homesteaders had when they stepped onto their new quarter section (160 acres, 65 square hectares) probably concerned a home. What to build it out of? In many places, the only material in abundance was the prairie sod itself. The sod today has all been ploughed and cultivated, but in those years, it was knotted together by the roots of hundreds of years of grasses and weeds and was very tough. It was also handy, so that was the material chosen by the pioneers to build their homes. First, they would plough out the floor plan, approximately 16 x 26 feet, or 5 x 8 metres. Then, they would cut down some poplar trees from the hills or from a nearby coulee and use it to build a frame. They would usually plough out additional sod, as it was going to be used as bricks and many bricks would be needed - 4,000 or so. Also, a ploughed area was needed around the house to act as a firebreak against the inevitable prairie fire. Then sod bricks were stacked against the poplar frame. Each brick would be 1.6 or 2 inches (4 go 5 cm) thick, about 16’ (40 cm) wide, and twice as long, and piled up with a slight inward tilt to help bear the weight. Doors and windows could be placed anywhere. The roof was made by stretching poles side by side between the walls, then laying down a layer of hay, a layer of sod, another layer of hay, then some more sod. Some homesteaders referred to that top layer as “government shingles”. Boards on the ground would make the floor, and cloth was pegged


into the dirt walls. Blankets were hung to make rooms. This was the little home on the prairie, warm in winter, cool in summer, although not particular dry, as noted by Ben. In 1909, Ben and his brothers, Pete and Angelus (Lus), decided to move to another area of Saskatchewan – Elrose - to take out homesteads there. Nathalie and her sons, Bill and Tay, maintained the business at Lanigan, which was very hard for them as Bill and Tay were both young and Marguerite was a baby. They had a horse and oxen. Bill could remember driving the wagon and oxen and the wagon getting stuck in the mud. The boys would have to push the wagon, with Nathalie following behind carrying her baby, helping as much as she could, as she was structurally quite a small person. These boys learned at a young age to be responsible and were a great help to their mother. At Elrose, Ben’s brother, Pete, homesteaded the north half of Section 14-25-16 W3 and Ben the south half of Section 14 (Dominion Land Grant records, ArchiviaNet). This land was hilly and stony prairie. Ben also acquired Lsds. 9, 10, 15 and 16, in Section 26-24-16 W3 along with the Alberta and Great Waterways Railway Co. (Source: Dominion Land Grant records, ArchiviaNet). In some townships, the railroad had accepted 8 or more sections as part of its land grant and if a quarter in one of these sections adjoining a homesteader’s land became available, the homesteader could claim the first right to purchase it at $3.00 per acre. The homesteader was required to break 50 acres within 3 years and be resident on either the homestead or the pre-emption for 6 months of each of 6 years. In 1908, all unclaimed odd and even numbered sections were released for homestead and pre-emption lands. Anita’s land that she inherited from William (Bill) consisted of the following lands:

Northwest quarter (NW/4) of Section 13, Township 25, Range 16, West of the Third Meridian (W3M) (150 acres) Southwest quarter (SW/4) of Section 13, Township 25, Range 16, W3M (160 acres) Northwest Quarter (NW/4) of Section 15, Township 25, Range 16, W3M (160 acres) Southeast Quarter (SE/4) of Section 22, Township 25, Range 16, W3M (160 acres) Southwest Quarter (SW/4) of Section 24, Township 25, Range 16, W3M (156 acres)


This land was owned by Anita and farmed by her nephew and grandson of Bill, Billy McCallum, until the summer of 2001. Anita and Billy both received offers on their land from a large farming concern in the area, and decided to sell. Fortunately, the purchaser is a local farmer. Its unfortunate that today, with economic conditions the way they are in Saskatchewan, a small farmer cannot survive. Some time later, Ben’s brother, Pete, decided to move from Saskatchewan to Lake Samanish, at Port Orchard, Washington, in the United States, where he purchased a summer resort. He had married Ferza, who was deaf, and they had 1 son, Theophile, and 1 daughter, Mary. Theophile married Irene, and had 1 daughter, Virginia. Mary married James Clarke, and they had 2 sons, Tom and Jim. Pete is thought to have died in 1945, and Ferza in 1950. Lus moved to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and died there of a burst appendix on June 4, 1917, leaving all his worldly goods to Pete, Ben, a sister, Maria Celina Boerjans (Mrs. Camiele Bierens) in Belgium, and Maria’s daughter, Leonie Roelant, also in Belgium. He never married or had any children of his own. Each beneficiary received $80. Bill and Tay looked for Lus’s grave in Saskatoon for years, but they were never able to find it. Bill’s granddaughter, Adrienne, has since located Lus’s grave; he is buried in Roselawn Cemetary.


Chapter 17 Homesteading at Elrose Ben’s land at Elrose, as part of the Palliser triangle, was fairly flat and very rich in nutrients for growing wheat, and the possibility existed for having a prosperous farm and raising livestock (horses, cows, chickens, ducks). Ben built a small wooden shack on one corner of the land to prove up the homestead but it was never really lived in. After building another house and barn on the other corner of the homestead for his family to live in, Ben returned to Lanigan to retrieve his wife and four children. After they settled at Elrose, Ben heard of land available for homestead to the west and wished to move again. Also, Pete tried to convince him to move to Lake Samanish where he heard he could buy a summer resort. Ben certainly had the wunderlust! However, Nathalie had settled into her new home and wasn’t about to move again. She said, “No more!. If you go, you go without me and the children.” Thus, the Boerjans remained in Elrose for the remainder of their lives. Over the years, Ben bought more land and enlarged the farm. He was a successful and prosperous farmer. He continued to farm the land until 1923. He had enjoyed his years of farming with horses, but when gas tractors took the place of horses he decided he would retire. He and Nathalie moved to their house in Elrose, and Bill and Valerie took over the day-to-day operations of the farm.


Chapter 18 Bill’s Siblings Tayfield, Bill’s younger brother, was the second oldest of Nathalie and Ben’s children. He was born in Kewanee, Illinois, on June 4, 1898. When Ben retired and he and Nathalie moved into the town of Elrose, Tay took over a half-section of land that Ben owned south of Elrose. Tay also farmed a half-section he had purchased from Gordon Torrance after Gordon’s retirement. Tay married Mary Hall of Sussex, New Brunswick, a teacher, in 1939. It was not a happy marriage, and they never had any children. Mary was an extremely unpleasant women and caused much dissent in the Boerjan family. Tay died of cancer in February 1966. Mary continued living in the area until her death. Joseph, Nathalie’s and Ben’s third living child, was born in Oakwood, North Dakota, on March 21, 1904, after they had returned to the U.S. from Belgium. He was never interested in farming and began his career in the Royal Bank of Canada when Mr. Baxter was manager. Joe later moved to California. He was an accountant for various companies in many parts of the world. Joe was quite a handsome man and charismatic person. The family perceived him as a “secret agent” because he often was incommunicato for long periods of time when employed by the U.S. government, and then he would just appear out of nowhere with all these exotic items from all over the world. He was reported to have been employed by the OSS, Engineering Division, in the U.S. government after the war, and he was stationed at various places throughout the world where missile sites were built for the U.S. government. One place he was stationed was Ascension Island. He was never allowed to tell anybody where these places were or to talk about his duties.

Joe’s first marriage was to a woman he met on a drunken bender, and they eloped. They tried to make a success of the marriage, but Joe’s wife was an alcoholic, and as much as they worked on the marriage, it eventually resulted in divorce. Joe was married again when he was older to Eleanor, who had grown-up daughters, and they were married for many years. They lived in the mountains of California for a awhile, where Joe operated a motel for the tourists, and eventually settled in Pasco, Washington, in a trailer park there. Joe had a beautiful flower garden – a hobby he very much enjoyed. Eleanor was an invalid for many years before she

Joe Boerjan


passed way, and Joe faithfully looked after her. Joe was loyal to the end to his friends and his family. In the last years of his life, his only companion was a small dog, Pepper, who was his best friend. Joe died in September 1987 in Pasco, Washington. His niece, Anita, who visited him often, and her husband journeyed to Pasco to take care of his affairs and make arrangements for the funeral. His ashes were spread over his beloved flower garden. Marguerite, the youngest child, and Ben and Nathalie’s only daughter, was born in St. Boniface, Manitoba, in April 1907. She completed her schooling in Elrose, married Clarence Harrison in 1927, and left the community. Clarence and Marguerite had three children: Mavis, who was born in 1928, Maurice, who was born in 1930 and who died in 1946 from head injuries sustained in a fall from the back of a pick-up truck, and Kenneth, who was born in 1933. Marguerite was very pretty - she was slim, blond, and always wore her hair in the latest style. She was an icon for her nieces, who were infatuated with her. She had been a flapper during the 1920’s - how exotic! She did the jitterbug at many dances in the area, which scandalized the community. Marguerite and Clarence lived at Coppercliffe, Ontario, for most of their married life where Clarence worked in the copper mines. He eventually died of emphysema because of his exposure to the dust in the mines. Marguerite died on May 8, 1969. She suffered from a brain illness before her death, and used to experience tunnel vision. It was never discovered if she had a tumour or if she had a genetic disease of the brain. However, her son, Kenneth, became mentally ill quite young and lived quite a few years in a hospital.


Chapter 19 Life in Elrose Ben was a good provider and Nathalie was a very good wife, mother, and grandmother. She was a very good mother-in-law to William’s wife, Valerie, who was very young when she moved to Canada and frightened of being so far from home. Nathalie made her feel comfortable and helped her in any way she could without being critical, bossy or snoopy. When Nathalie’s granddaughters stayed with her, she was always encouraging them to eat. She was a small, roly-poly woman who liked to eat herself. She had the old-country, instilled belief that you ate everything on your plate because you never knew when you would get to eat again. In the photo at the right, Marguerite, Joe, Tay, Ben, Bill are standing and Nathalie is seated. Having your photo taken was a very serious business then, so nobody smiled. Of interest is the fact that Bill’s grandson, Evan, greatly resembles Ben – people who see a photo of Ben in his youth always mistake him for Evan. Nathalie was also a good member of her community. She was selected “The Mother of the Year” in Elrose in 1951. During the war years, she was very active in the work of the Red Cross and was an Honorary Life Member. She was a member of the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church and a life member of the Catholic Women’s League. Nathalie had medical problems due to her difficult confinements. She suffered from a detached uterus which in those days couldn’t be treated (she would have to treat it herself as best she could). One interesting fact about Nathalie’s pregnancies was that she never stopped having her monthly period when she was pregnant. The first indication she had that she was pregnant was when she felt life at about 4 to 5 months. Natalie died of cancer on Thursday, March 15, 1955. She had hardly any teeth left, and was having trouble eating. Her stomach would become very upset after she ate. After experiencing these symptoms for some time, she had Anita take her to the dentist because she thought she needed false teeth. Natalie thought if she could chew properly, her problems would disappear. However, after further investigation, it was found that she had cancer.


Ben had been a very hard-working man all his life, but he was a bit of a hypochondriac. He always seemed to be ill, and Natalie always took care of him and made him feel better (probably knowing that he wasn’t really sick) up until the day she died. Anita remembers that every day Ben would have tea steeped with a senna leaf because he had trouble moving his bowels otherwise. He had sat on the ice blocks when working in St. Boniface, Manitoba, and he had to have surgery at a young age on his lower bowels to correct a problem that resulted. Ben was extremely dependent on Nathalie both emotionally and physically and only lived for a year after her death. One feature many remember about Ben was his shock of thick white hair and his bushy mustache.


Chapter 20 Bill and Valerie Bill grew up helping his father on the farm, and when he was about 17 or 18 he decided to move back to the U.S., where he worked in International Falls, Minnesota, in the paper mill. He met his future wife, Valerie, there. She was staying with her sister, Vitaline, who introduced them. They started courting and fell in love. Valerie was a very petite, pretty, dark-haired French girl, with large brown eyes. Bill was a large, barrel-chested, handsome man, with lots of dark curly hair. When they were married, Valerie wore her hair in pigtails and wore a blue dress. Her parents were their witnesses. Bill wished to serve in the Armed Forces during the war years, so before he was married he joined the American Army as he was too young for the Canadian army. He had tried to join the Canadian Expeditionary Force, but was underage. He had been accepted after stating he was old enough, and when Nathalie discovered this she immediately wrote the government and told them he wasn’t old enough, and that she wouldn’t give permission for him to join the services. She remembered all the young men, like her husband, who had left Belgium and moved to America to avoid the draft, and also the many men that had died in the wars in Europe. She would never give permission for her son to join the Army! It wasn’t long until Bill was old enough, however, and he joined the American army, and served in the Army of Occupation in the 1st World War as a Sargent in the Medical Corps. He was stationed overseas at the end of the war. He picked up the wounded and buried the dead. While Bill was overseas, Anita was born in 1919. She was a premature, very small baby. Valerie lived with her family at Crookston, Minnesota, while Bill was in the service, and she

gave birth to her baby at home. She was only 19 and very frightened, but her parents were a great support to her. She shared a room with her sister, Dora, and tiny Anita slept between them at night. Valerie is sure this is how Anita survived. She was kept fed, warm, safe, and very loved for those crucial first months of her life. Bill’s friends often teased him while in France about all the pretty French girls they would see, and Bill would always answer, “I have my own pretty little French girl waiting for me at home”. He wrote Valerie often while he was overseas, and when he returned home he brought her many gifts from France, such as handkerchiefs and scarves, which she treasured and passed on to her granddaughters. When Bill returned from Europe, he wished to move his new family

Young Anita 1


closer to home, so he and Valerie moved to Canada. They drove to Saskatchewan in a Model T Ford convertible, quite a unique car for that time. Valerie and Bill had two more daughters, Blanche, born April 30, 1920, and Viola, born November 23, 1923. Valerie always wanted to give Bill a son, because the Boerjan name in our branch of the family died if there were no sons born to Nathalie and Ben’s children. Valerie had a miscarriage once, and she and Bill were very sad. The doctor asked her if she wanted to know what sex the baby was, but she wouldn’t allow the doctor to tell her, because she would have been devastated if it had been a boy. She could never have any more children after that. Bill built a new house on the farm in 1929. He bought the goods, and paid for the labour by providing board and room for the construction crew. Thus, he was able to provide employment and lodgings for people in the area at a time when unemployment was high. He was a very good farmer, and extremely successful businessman. Other men in the Elrose area were taken in by crooks who were travelling throughout the area selling fake stocks in non-existent mines. Bill was one of the few men in the area to see through their schemes, and did not participate. Others in the area lost everything. Bill survived the Dirty Thirties quite intact, with the family surviving by raising their own food. Bill was a very respected member of the community. He was on the hospital board for many years, he belonged to the Elrose Branch of the Royal Canadian Legion (a Canadian veterans’ club), and he was very active in the Roman Catholic Church in Elrose. The priests that came to the Immaculate Heart of Mary parish in Elrose always sought Bill out for his sage advice. Bill also had a love of the hunt, and every fall he would go hunting for moose and deer. His grandson, Bill, has inherited this love, and hunts to this day. Valerie was also active in the community and very busy raising her children. She belonged to the Legion Auxiliary and the Catholic Women’s League. Bill and Valerie always loved to travel (there is that wunderlust again) and they made a trip every other year to Minnesota, so that Valerie could see her family. One form of entertainment they enjoyed very much was attending motion pictures, and when they visited in Minnesota, they attended the movie theatre often with Valerie’s sisters. When Bill and Valerie lived on the farm and the children were young, the girls would stay in town with their Ben and Nathalie (Grandma and Grandpa) Boerjan during the week and attend school, as the roads were quite often impassable in the winter. On the weekends they would return to the farm. Because they spent so much time with their grandparents, they were very close to Ben and Nathalie in many ways. Nathalie learned to read and write


English when Anita attended school because when Anita worked on her schoolwork, she taught Nathalie at the same time. Perhaps this led Anita to her decision to become a teacher when she grew up. Nathalie never could read Belgium, however, and when she received letters from Ben’s niece, Leonie, she would have Mrs. Verbruggen, a Belgium neighbour and good friend, translate them for her. On Halloween, the girls weren’t allowed to venture out with their school friends to trick-or-treat, because Ben and Nathalie didn’t want their grandchildren “begging at people’s doors for candy”. However, they were encouraged to hand out candy to the children that came knocking at the Boerjan door. When the girls got older, they rode to school in a horse-drawn wagon that went around the area collecting children from the various farms. One cold winter day the wagon tipped over, and the stove, which had a full-blown fire going, fell on Anita, burning her quite badly. She had to stay home from school for many months, and her teachers sent all her school work home for her to work on. Luckily, Anita had good self-discipline, and she excelled in academics. She was accelerated (skipping two grades), and graduated at the age of 16. Anita was required to remain at home for 2 years because she could not attend any of the post-secondary schools until she was 18. She wanted to become a teacher, so when she was old enough she asked her dad if she could attend the university in the fall. He thought about it, and said “If we get a crop this year, certainly you may”. Sure enough, that year’s crop was successful, and Anita applied for Teachers’ College and was accepted. Valerie set out to obtain a board and room situation for Anita in Saskatoon for the first few months of school. Valerie wanted to make sure the accommodations were suitable for a girl Anita’s age so she travelled to Saskatoon with Anita on the bus. Valerie was always a friendly person, and quite talkative, so she never hesitated to visit with people she was in close proximity to. She struck up a conversation with a woman who was also travelling to Saskatoon, and this woman owned a boarding house that was close to the Teachers’ College (then called Normal School). She told Valerie to come see her if she did not find a suitable place. Valerie and Anita investigated several boarding houses, but Valerie did not feel any of them were suitable. She remembered the lady on the bus, so she decided to take her up on her offer. She found the accommodations very suitable, and Anita moved in. She worked for a portion of her room and board and attended school. Anita lived at the boarding house until the winter of 1938-39, when Bill, Valerie, Anita and Viola moved into Saskatoon for the winter. They rented a house on 5th Avenue, a luxurious house that belonged to Mr. Wilson, the mayor of Saskatoon, who was spending the winter in Hawaii. Blanche visited her Aunt Marguerite in Ontario during this time. Vi attended the convent to complete high school and then went on to Robertson’s Business College. Anita


and Vi always walked home for lunch. In the spring, Bill and Valerie moved back to the farm as it was time to plant the crop, and Anita moved in with the Angus family, where she could work for her room and board. Valerie and Bill lived on the farm until 1946, when they moved to Elrose. Their daughter, Blanche, and her husband, Carl, took over the day-to-day operation of the farm. Valerie and Bill decided to travel, and drove to Texas for the winter of 1940. In 1953, they went to Florida on holiday. In 1955, they went to Texas on vacation to do some reconnaissance for their future. On September 19, 1962, their daughter, Viola, died of cancer in Vancouver, British Columbia, which was very sad because she was so young. She was Bill’s baby, as well, and he grieved for her in a significant way. After that, they decided to spend the winter in Texas. They did this every year until Bill’s death on August 19, 1981, and Valerie continued to travel to Texas for the winter until 1989, when her health prohibited it. Bill’s brother, Tay, and his wife, Mary, also lived in Texas in the same trailor park as Bill and Valerie. Many other people from the Elrose area also wintered in the southern United States, and many spent time with the Boerjans at McAllen. They lived in the Trailor Town park in McAllen, Texas, in the Rio Grande valley, very close to the border between the U.S. and Mexico. Their daughters continued the tradition, and spent many winters in Texas, and the tradition has been passed on to their grandchildren, who are now just beginning to spend their winters in Texas. There’s that old wunderlust again! After Bill’s death, Valerie lived in their house as long as she could but felt she should move into the Golden Years Lodge due to her increasing frail health. She sold the house to the new Alliance minister, who was a young married man with small children. She was extremely happy that it went to such a pious person as she was always very spiritual. He was a kind man, and often visited her in the Lodge. Valerie enjoyed most the time she spent with her daughters, grandchildren, and greatgrandchildren. Her and Bill’s descendents number in the 50’s, so family parties were a sight to see. This number is continuing to grow as her greatgrandchildren are starting their families now. Valerie died on October 12, 1995. She was 95 years old and she never lost her mental capacity. She was still that “pretty little French girl”. Anita Anita successfully completed teachers’ college and returned home, looking forward to a summer of fun with her friends at the lake. Bill and Valerie had a summer cottage at Clearwater Lake, about 25 miles from Elrose, where the family often spent their summers. There were many attractions for the young people of the day: swimming, boating, fishing,


and dancing in the evenings. It was a summer fun spot for the whole area, as the lake was a spring-fed lake, and very clean. Anita and Blanche both had many friends there. Anita was impressed with one young man in particular, Earl Olson. He played saxophone in the dance band that entertained at the circular dance floor in the evenings and he operated the local barbershop and pool hall during the day with his brother, Ernie. Earl was a favourite of all the girls, and had gone on a date or two with Anita’s sister, Blanche. However, when he saw Anita and she saw him, sparks flew. The day they met, Anita had a date with another young man she had been seeing, but she forgot all about it and ended up standing him up. Also, her sister, Blanche, was quite annoyed with Anita because she liked Earl and wished to date him. Anita and Earl dated for two weeks, and became engaged. They were engaged for three years, trying to save money. After three years, they decided not to wait anymore, and were married at the family farm. When Bill met Earl, and saw how he and Anita felt about each other, he worried about how this would affect Anita’s future career. He wanted to see a return on the investment he had made in her education, so he told Anita that he wished her to teach school for three years before she was married. Then, she could get married with his full blessing. Anita always said those three years were some of the hardest years of her life. She couldn’t bear to be away from Earl, yet she couldn’t bear to be with him, anticipating when they would have to part. The first year she taught at Kyle (the Clearwater Lake School), and the third year she taught at Eston (Cascaden School District). The second year she taught school in a small, one-room school in Saskatchewan: Biggar (Louvain School). The conditions were far from good. She taught Grades 1 to 12. She either boarded out with a family or stayed right in the school. In one school at Biggar she taught children who did not even speak English, with the exception of one student, who acted as her interpretor when he could. It was a Russian and Ukrainian community, and the Russians and Ukrainians were feuding. Anita was often caught in the middle as the parents would come and complain to her about how their children were treated by a child from the other faction. Anita and Earl were finally married at the family farm at Elrose on July 19, 1942. Earl had joined the Canadian Air Force, and was a member of the Air Force Band. Their duties consisted of entertaining the troops throughout the country and promoting the sale of War Bonds. Anita and Earl lived in Victoriaville, Quebec, where Earl was stationed. Their first daughter, Elaine, was born there on April 11, 1943. Anita shared a flat with the wife of an army buddy of Earl’s, as Earl was away most of the time. Elaine was a very collicky child, and Anita a very nervous first-time mother. Earl obtained a 1-month leave so they decided


they should visit Saskatchewan. They rode the train across Canada with their small baby. Elaine had cried most of her first three months, as Anita followed “The Canadian Mother and Child” to the letter, which only allowed feeding every four hours. While on the train, Anita fed Elaine as much as she wanted so her crying would not disturb the other passengers. Elaine drank three 8-ounce bottles, quite a lot for a 3-month old baby, and slept for 24 hours straight. Anita threw away “The Canadian Mother and Child” and thereafter depended on her instincts, which were very good. When Anita became pregnant with her second child, she and Earl decided she should come home to Saskatchewan to give birth. Their second child, Julianne, was born in Elrose on June 16, 1945. As Earl was still in the service, Anita lived in a small house in Elrose with Blanche and her son, Billy, as Blanche’s husband, Carl, was overseas. The house was located next to Nathalie and Ben’s house. She lived there until Earl was released from the Air Force in August of 1945. Earl was offered a job in Ottawa with Central Band, Air Force, which would have allowed him to pursue his music career, but he and Anita talked it over and decided they would prefer to settle in Elrose to raise their children. They owned the Elrose Barbershop and Pool Hall on Main Street in Elrose. Their house was situated behind it, and was very large. It also had a large yard for the children to play in and a garage. Anita and Earl had a further five children, three girls and two boys. Due to Earl’s long hours in the pool hall, 10:00 in the morning to 10:00 at night, and Earl wanting to spend more time with his family, in the early 1960's, Earl converted the Pool Hall to a laundromat. Because the barbershop closed at 6:00, Earl finally had his evenings free. However, at that time, he developed a bad case of asthma, and was quite ill from that time until his death. He was able to take his family on many camping vacations, however, which they enjoyed very much. They vacationed in such places as Cypress Hills, Good Spirit Lake, and Banff, Alberta. Earl played in two dance bands, the Hugh MacDonald orchestra and the Corbet band, all his married life. Anita used to request this song when they went to dances, “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore” to tease him because Earl was always in the orchestra pit and she was left with no dance partner. It used to annoy Earl no end. Anita and Earl had seven children in all. Anita used to joke that she spent a lot of time in the Elrose Hospital; she had six of her children there and eventually worked there. In fact, when she first started working at the hospital, her office was the old delivery room where she had spent many hours in labour.


Earl died in July 1966 just two weeks after their second daughter, Julianne, was married. Anita had been quite ill for some time, and was exhausted after Julianne’s wedding. She went to the lake with Valerie and Bill to rest and recuperate. At that time, Earl was in good health, so his death came as a surprise to all his family. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police had to be called to find Anita at the lake, and Valerie, Anita, and Bill came home immediately. There were still young children at home when Earl died. It was a struggle for Anita to raise the remainder of the children. She worked part-time at the post office for a few years, and then was employed as the Elrose hospital administrator. She is a very talented lady. She was hospital administrator the year the new hospital in Elrose was built, and she was involved in that operation on a day-to-day basis. Anita followed the tradition of her parents and grandparents, and was always very active in the community - she is a long-standing member of the Royal Canadian Legion and the Catholic Women’s League. She also belonged to the church choir for many years, and she and her daughter Patricia sang alto. As well, she played saxophone in the Elrose Legion Band, under the leadership of her husband. At one time, she was Brown Owl in the local Brownies troop. Upon retirement, Anita began to spend the winters in the Rio Grande Valley, in McAllen, Texas, after her youngest, Cheryl, left home to attend Red Deer College. She met Claude there. He had just begun to travel south for the winter, and lived in the same trailor park as Anita. He was from Remsen, Iowa - a very handsome and distinguished looking man. He was a widower with seven children. They were married on December 11, 1982. Anita and Claude spent many winters in Texas and summers at Palliser Regional Park, on Lake Diefenbaker, in Saskatchewan. Rusty’s Coulee Marina, on Lake Diefenbaker at Palliser, was operated by Anita’s daughter, Julie, and her husband, Francis, for quite a few years. Anita and Claude moved to Saskatoon because Anita was required to undergo dialysis treatments at St. Paul’s Hospital. They have lived at Caleb Manor for the last three years; however, in the spring of 2007 Claude’s health deteriorated to the point where he moved into a seniors’ home in Remsen, Iowa. Anita misses Claude very much, but many family members and friends from Caleb visit her.


Blanche Beatrice Blanche was a tomboy all her life, and she loved nothing more than working with her father on the farm. She never was a fan of housework as a child, although she was an extremely good housekeeper when she was an adult. Blanche joined the Armed Forces during the war, where she met her husband, Carl McCallum. She was a part-time ambulance driver and part-time chauffeur for the officers. Carl was a cook. After the war was over, the young couple moved to the east coast, where Carl’s family was, but they weren’t happy there. They decided to move west, and Carl joined the Boerjan farming operation. This was a new skill for him because he was a maritimer, but he was smart and willing, and it didn’t take him long to learn the ropes. Blanche worked right alongside him. Their first child was a son, Carl William, whom they called Billy, born in 1943. They had a daughter, Judy, in 1946. They had a medical problem known as the RH factor, so they were never able to have any more children. They felt lucky to have two children. Carl and Blanche lived on the farm in the summer and in their house in Elrose in the winter. This allowed the children to attend school without worrying about inclement weather. Their house was 1 block from Anita’s, and Blanche and Anita were always very close. Billy was a quiet child, but Judy was very active. In Grade 1 the teacher had to tie her to her desk because she liked to wander around the classroom visiting with the other children rather than attending to her studies. Blanche died in the winter of 1989, one of the coldest in history. She died of lung cancer, which was ironic, because her husband had had a lung removed due to cancer 20 years before. It was thought they may both have been exposed to chemicals in the farming operation over the years that led to the cancer. Their son, Bill, operated the family farm until his health dictated a change of lifestyle. The land was sold but Bill still lives in the main house. Carl lived in Elrose for many years before dying in 2005.


Viola Viola also joined the Armed Forces during the war. She married Donald McDonald right after the war and moved with him to British Columbia. They had three daughters, Bonnie, Sandy and Joanne. Vi had a very tragic, troubled and unhappy adult life. Her only solace was her religion and her children. She was far from her family, and her husband was an chronic alcoholic who could become violent and abusive. Vi developed breast cancer at a young age and it spread rapidly. She died on September 19, 1962. Mac died an old withered man in 1990.

Vi and Anita


In Closing... When Ben and Nathalie decided to emigrate to the New World, it must have been a frightening time for them. Whatever their future would have been in Belgium, their future in the United States and Canada was both exciting and uncertain. They set out to make their mark on the world, and this they did. Ben was a successful farmer, and he passed this knowledge on to two of his sons. He also passed on his work ethic to all his children. Nathalie was a loving individual, and made their home lives safe and secure. She instilled in the children a strong belief in God and feeling of responsibility to their community. These values were in turn passed on to the next generation .. and they continue on. Nathalie and Ben had courage, integrity, and strong character, and their great grandchildren are proud to claim them as their own.

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THE BELGIANSTHE BELGIANS

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