Memorial Resistance Fighter Constant Martiny

This memorial commemorates Constant Martiny, a Belgian secret agent who was arrested on May 13, 1941. After a detention in Saint-Gilles, he was brought to Berlin on September 16, 1941. On August 26, 1942, he was executed in Berlin.

Text on the monument:

IN MEMORIAM
CONSTANT MARTINY
1888-1942
PREMIER AGENT BELGE
PARACHUTE EN BELGIQUE LE 13/10/1940
FUSILLE A BERLINE LE 26/08/1942

Constant Martiny was already parachuted in the Ardennes on the night of 12 to 13 October 1940 as a secret agent. The choice of this region may have been due to the fact that Constant came from here - he was born in La Roche. The intention was that he would set up a network and pass on information to the government in exile. His adventure started particularly badly: when he came down he broke his foot - an open leg fracture. Doctor Jacqmain from La Roche patched up Constant and, despite his situation, immediately went to Brussels to set up the "Martiny-Daumerie-Cleempoel" network that would cover almost the entire territory of Belgium. He was arrested on 13 May 1941 by the Germans who had probed him when he was sending messages with his radio. At that time, Constant had already sent more than 300 messages to London.
A few days later, other members of his network were also arrested, including Joseph Daumerie and Irène Tintant, Constant's wife.
Constant Martiny was deported to Germany, was convicted there by the court of war in September 1941 and was shot together with 5 associates on 26 August 1942.
His wife, Irène, was sentenced to forced labor and taken to Mauthausen concentration camp. From there she was moved to Ravensbrück to end up in Bergen-Belsen. There she died of exhaustion at the end of April 1945, just after her camp was freed by the British on the 15th of that month.

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Source

• Text: TracesOfWar, Christian Kaiser & Tim t' Kint
• Photos: Tim t' Kint (1, 3), Christian Kaiser (2, 4)