A magician from the West Flemish coastal municipality of Middelkerke made a surprising discovery while he was clearing up some of conjuring equipment. Chris Toon was souring out items contained in an old box when he found a letter that was send during the Nazi occupation.
Man from West Flanders finds a letter written by soldier interned in Nazi labour camp
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The letter appears to have been written in 1943 by a French soldier interned in a German labour camp. The letter was addressed to the soldier’s parents. Chris Toon now hopes to find the soldier's family.
The letter is postmarked 5 October 1943 and is addressed to a couple that lived on Rue Kemmel in Armentières, a town in the north of France, not far from the Belgian border.
Chris Toon told VRT News that "The letter was written by a certain Louis Allard. As far as I understand, he was in a labour camp at the time".
The letter is addressed to Louis Allard’s parents. It's about bombings, long hours and money intended for his parents that never arrived. We all want to find the letter writer's family".
Chris Toon has already shared photographs of the letter on social media in an effort to try and trace its writer’s family. "This has been a huge success, because the original post has already been shared 7,000 times."
Thanks to the response on social media Chris has been able learn more about the letter-writer’s family. For example, he now knows the name of Louis Allard’s wife and that his daughter was called Agnes.
The interest in the letter has far exceeded Chris' Toon’s expectations: "There has already been someone asking about it at the door and and someone else has contacted the local authority to see if they can provide more information about the Allard family. The phone hasn’t started ringing yet, but I believe that it will start ringing within the week. The letter has attracted so much attention that it can’t be long before it finds its way to Louis’ family”, Chris Toon told VRT News.