Laurent Houtain. Collection

Laurent Houtain was born in Liège, Belgium, on 7 April 1912. He studied music at the conservatory and worked as a violinist for the ‘Nationaal Instituut voor de Radio-omroep’ or NIR [National Institute for Radio broadcasting] as of 1936. In 1933 he had joined the communist youth organisation in Belgium, and had become a militant member of the ‘Amis de l’Union Soviétique’ [Friends of the Soviet Union Association]. During the war, Laurent Houtain went underground, leading a group of communist intellectuals. The communist party then sent him as a political secretary to Verviers, where he was arrested by the Nazi authorities. On 9 October 1943, Laurent Houtain was interned in the prison of Liège. He was severely tortured, before being deported to Germany. He was liberated in the Dachau concentration camp and was repatriated to Belgium on 15 May 1945. Laurent Houtain was immediately transferred to the Saint-Pierre Hospital, where he passed away on 26 June 1945. A commemorative service was held for him and the other murdered employees of the NIR on 9 May 1946. During the ceremony, a commemorative plaque was revealed in their honour.

On 23 September 2007 Walter Legley (son of Victor Legley who was a Belgian violinist, a composer of classical music, and a friend of Laurent Houtain) kindly donated the original items in this collection to the Jewish Museum of Deportation and Resistance, predecessor of Kazerne Dossin.

Walter Legley, 2007