Belgium and The Netherlands
Instead, on 2 September, the Brigade as well as the Dutch Princess Irene Brigade was transferred to the 2nd British Army and ordered to move as quickly as possible to the Belgian border. The British Army was already in Belgium and expected to enter Brussels on the following day and this transfer would allow the Belgian and Dutch Brigades to operate in their homelands. The Brigade arrived at the French/Belgian border on 3 September after an overnight journey and continued to Rongy in Brussels the following day, just after the British.
During their advance through Belgium, the Belgian troops were sometimes mistaken for French Canadians, since local people did not expect that their liberators would be fellow Belgians. The Belgian Brigade liberated other Belgian towns and cities before reaching the Netherlands border on 22 September. Its campaign in the Netherlands lasted until 17 November, when it was relieved from the front and moved into reserve in Leuven. The "Piron Brigade" returned to the Netherlands between 11 April 1945 and June 1945.
In the small Dutch border town of Thorn, a bridge has been named in honour of its liberation on 25 September 1944.
Read more about this topic: 1st Belgian Infantry Brigade
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