Research on Belgian refugees

Despite the hundreds of publications with substantially relevant sections and the tons of references in newspapers, local and national ones but also those published in exile, the story of the roughly 250,000 Belgians in Britain has been overlooked for a long time. Surely the nearing Centenary is triggering a plethora of events, activities, research (both professional and personal/family) but in the end it remains difficult to gauge the credit due to Peter Cahalan.

Peter Cahalan is an Australian who studied at McMaster, Hamilton, Canada when he discovered a niche in history that would suit his PhD thesis well. Under the supervision of Dr. R.A. Rempel, Cahalan graduated in December 1977 with "The Treatment of Belgian Refugees in England During the Great War". This PhD thesis can be downloaded from McMaster Digital Commons, expect a 24MB file.

In 1982, Garland Publishing (New York) published a book of his thesis. You can access "Belgian refugee relief in England during the Great War" through Google Books, but only for searching purposes.


Peter Cahalan now works in Australia, keeping a focus on a historical approach in tourism.

Other PhD theses, available through McMaster Commons too, supervised by Rempel, himself keen on Bertrand Russell, and arguably of interest to people with a passion for WWI are:

• Demons and domesticity: A history of women and the London gas industry, 1889--1939
• The Women of Red Clydeside: Women Munitions Workers in the West of Scotland during the First World War

The latter will bring us on a post on Katherine Storr soon.