René Lambrichts

René Lambrichts (1 April 1900 – 24 November 1993) was a Belgian lawyer and far-right activist who founded and led Volksverwering (French: La Défense du Peuple), an antisemitic organisation established in Antwerp in 1937. Under German occupation during the Second World War, Volksverwering resumed propaganda activity with the occupier’s approval, organised anti-Jewish meetings and film screenings, and welcomed anti-Jewish ordinances; activists from the group were among the instigators of the Antwerp pogrom of April 1941.

Lambrichts was born in Borgerhout and died in Uccle .

Life Lambrichts studied at Antwerp secondary schools and briefly enrolled at the Catholic University of Leuven in 1919 before enlisting in the French Foreign Legion the same year; after contracting typhus he returned to Belgium in 1924 with serious hearing loss. Around 1928 he took up law studies, completed his traineeship (1933–1935) and joined the Flemish Bar Conference in Antwerp. He moved in Belgian-nationalist circles (Jonge Belgen/Jeunes Belges; the youth of the National Legion) and edited the corporatist union paper De Stormloop (1933–1936).

War and occupation At the German invasion in May 1940, Belgian authorities interned a range of “suspects,” including radical Flemish nationalists. On 13 May, detainees such as August Borms, René Lagrou and René Lambrichts were evacuated from Antwerp’s Begijnenstraat prison towards France. Returning to Belgium after the Armistice, Lambrichts resumed activity. From October 1940 the occupier allowed Volksverwering to restart propaganda: the paper reappeared, anti-Jewish exhibitions and meetings were organised (including one on 15 December 1940), and in March 1941 the paper was retitled Volksche Aanval (“People’s Attack”). Lambrichts died in Uccle on 24 November 1993.