Adegem town

Of course during his working visit to the Meetjesland on Thursday 27 June 1974 King Baldwin also visited the Candian Cemetery.  He was enthusiastically received by a great many, and especially the school children cheered the sovereign very heartily.  We see the king leaving the cemetery accompanied by governor De Kinder and burgomaster Jozef De Prest.

On 13 September 1970 Albert De Kesel welcomed the guest as burgomaster for the second and last time because after the town council elections it was clear Dr. Jozef De Prest would take over.

Until the merger with Maldegem in 1976 nothing  of the Canada Day template was changed with the sole exception that the Canadian airplane for dropping the poppies was replaced with a Belgian army helicopter.  Ths change was no doubt brought about by the fact that in 1973 the Canadian plane had to accomplish its task in a heavy fog.  That had been not only dangerous but also very expensive since the plane had come from a base in Germany and if it had been unable to accomplish its mission that would have been a long flight for nothing.

In 1973-74 the godfathers and godmothers who took care of a grave were written about for the last time even if several of them still kept in touch with relatives of Canadian men KIA.

An item in the program of the working visit to the Meetjesland of King Baldwin on Thursday 27 June 1974 was a stop at the Canadian Cemetery.  The visit went off in a very informal and relaxed atmosphere.  Through an honor guard of hundreds of school children from Eeklo, Oostwinkel and Adegem the king went to the Cross of Sacrifice to lay a wreath and spend a few moments in subdued silence.

A very proud burgomaster De Prest gave a word of explanation about the cemetery and the war casualties.  The king signed the Cemetery Register and spoke for a while with teachers and war veterans.  After this and once again to great acclaim King Baldwin went to lay flowers on the graves of fallen Belgian soldiers in the center of Adegem.  And so he too had for a while been out of this world and perhaps that's why he was so relaxed and smiling broadly.   [Note of the translator: in a distant past Adegem was so remote that until this day it is known as the town "outside this world".]

In 1976 Jozef De Prest MD also acted as host for the last time because, due to the law on the merger of municipalities this was the end of Adegem as an independent town and together with Middelburg it became part of Maldegem town.  This was obviously a major historic event for the town.  But if the consequences were more consequential for the population they were not negligeable for the Canada Day either.

It is necessary to honor here two Adegem burgomasters who during a few decades gave their all for the commemoration ceremonies and the reception and comfort of the important guests and this not only at the occasion of the Canada Day.  Albert De Kesel as well as Jozef De Prest spared no effort to make the ceremony a commemoration the population was closely involved with.

It is therefore quite inaccurate when a few years later someone wrote that the Canada Day during the last years of the Adegem town council no longer really represented all that much and that is was slowly bleeding to death.  The pictures and the documents alike show that the commemoration of the Canadian KIA always took place in a smart, intimate way full of atmosphere.  Canadian Ambassadors and other Canadian visitors were always full of praise for what little Adegem did for their fallen boys; they praised especially the simplicity and sincerity of the ceremony.

Charles Davidson Jack, regional director of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, who year after year gave his permission to organize the ceremony said it this way: "The warm and friendly welcome you gave us has touched us deeply and we have always been very impressed with this simple and moving ceremony..."