The team in command of one of the British army hospitals.

The residents of Sint-Katelijne-Waver continue to commemorate the Second World War. For example, the municipality has erected a monument to commemorate the British Lancaster bomber that was shot down by the Germans on the night of 24-25 April 1944. The plane crashed close to Borgersteinhoeve, on the border of Sint-Katelijne-Waver and Mechelen.

From October 1944 to July 1946, the Institute of the Ursuline Sisters in Our Lady of Wavre served as a military hospital. At first, the British troops took care of their wounded there. More than 1000 patients stayed in the institute. In the spring of 1945, they return home. The British made way for about a hundred Belgian soldiers who recovered from their wounds there.Redundant bunkers?In the late 1930s, the Belgian army hastily built some forty bunkers in Sint-Katelijne-Waver. The bunkers are part of the so-called KW-stelling, which runs from Koningshooikt to Wavre (nowadays Walloon Brabant). The position is important in the plan for the defence of Belgium against Germany, but is ultimately of no use.In May 1940, the German army broke through the Allied lines in France and the Ardennes and rapidly conquered Belgium. After the Second World War, the bunkers lost their purpose. From 1953, they are sold off.

Libération et bunkers