Pieter Dox


Petrus Joannes Maria Dox was a Belgian soldier from Flanders who was sent to a penal military unit—the woodchopping platoon of the Orne—because of his opposition to the treatment of Flemish soldiers by French-speaking officers during the First World War.

Biography

World War I

Around 1914, Dox joined the Dominican Order as a novice. In 1916, despite a royal decree that only men born before 1897 could be conscripted, he was drafted to fight in the First World War. As a member of the seminary, Dox had to serve in the medical corps, and after only a single month of training he was sent to the front.
He was critical of the French-speaking officers' attitude towards Flemish-speaking soldiers, and wrote letters on the subject. This led to his demotion to a penal unit, the woodchopping platoon of the Orne, which he joined on 30 March 1918. The military's official conclusion read: "Doubts regarding his patriotism. Has expressed hostility toward national institutes in a letter sent from neutral territory." Dox was released eight months after the Armistice of 11 November 1918, on 10 July 1919.
One of his brothers, Ludovicus Gommarus, died in a German prison of war camp. His parents were also held captive by the German occupiers due to his father's participation in the resistance movement.

Missionary in Congo

Dox took his religious vows in Ghent on 7 November 1924, and moved to the Belgian Congo on 18 December 1928, to work as a missionary for the next 36 years under his priest name Valentinus.
He and his brother Frans were killed in Watsa during the Simba rebellion on 26 November 1964. In total, 15 Belgian missionaries were killed. A street in their hometown of Lier was named after him and his brother.