Scholarship, identity and lies: the political life of H J de vleeschauwer, 1940–1955

In October 1974, Kleio published an article by Belgium-born Herman Jan Melania de Vleeschauwer (1899-1986). 1 That article was based on a lecture delivered in the Depar tment of History at the University of South Africa (Unisa) and recalled his memories as a s tudent of Henri Pirenne (1862-1935), the noted Belgian historian. De Vleeschauwer was then a re t i red academic f rom Unisa. The lecture b lended philosophical musings with recollections of Pirenne. As a self-styled philosopher of his tory and cultural historian, this approach probably came natural ly to him, or perhaps his ret i rement provided the chance to reflect on his own long and intriguing career. De Vleeschauwer observed that Pirenne, who had maintained a studied neutral i ty between German and French his tor iography until the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, broke with the former to become a celebrated exponent of the latter. 2 He had also refused to teach while the Germans occupied Belgium. For this, Pirenne had been deported in March 1916 by the German occupying forces in Belgium. He was interned in German concentra t ion camps and remained there until December 1918. But jus t twenty two years later, this s tudent of Pirenne did jus t the opposite. With the second occupat ion of Belgium by Germany in the Second World War in May 1940, De Vleeschauwer