Missing Dunkirk Altar returns to Talbot House
An altar dating from the Second World War and lost for many years has been donated to Talbot House, the former British soldiers’ club and present-day museum in Poperinge (West Flanders).
British soldiers rescued the Dunkirk Altar from a church in Normandy during the Second World War and donated it to Talbot House in memory of fallen comrades. But during renovation work in the Sixties the altar disappeared.
The local scouts took it in and it eventually ended up in a brewery. Only recently was it rediscovered purely by accident allowing it to be returned.
The altar will now rest in the chapel in the house’s attic that already accommodates two similar altars. During a ceremony with pomp that only the British can create Simon Louagie, the manager of Talbot House, was pleased to accept the Dunkirk Altar from soldiers from the same regiment that donated it in the first place.
“It is such a privilege to have this altar returned to the chapel where it belongs, in the club were so many Second World War soldiers sought respite” says Corporal Steven Holt of the Corps of Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers.