Documentaries

Little film exists about the Belgian merchant navy at war. What there is usually concerns the Dutch or the British merchant service – but that was the same war, in the same convoys, with the same submarines. Below is what can be watched or read online. If you know of another, please say so.

To watch

• Gevaren op zee: de koopvaardij in WOII, deel 1Dutch · 2005 · ~25 minA Dutch broadcast, free to watch. It is about the Dutch merchant navy, but the war at sea was the same one Belgian crews fought: the same convoys, the same submarines, the same inability to go home. Former crew members tell it themselves.opens on another site →
• Gevaren op zee: de koopvaardij in WOII, deel 2Dutch · 2005 · ~25 minThe sequel: the homecoming, and what became of merchant seamen afterwards. Also free to watch.opens on another site →
• Een vergeten zeemansgeschiedenisDutch · 2010A documentary by Goert Giltay on what the war did to merchant seafaring families. This page describes the film and where it can be seen.opens on another site →
• Koopvaardij in de Tweede WereldoorlogDutchA museum film on the merchant navy at war, with archive footage.opens on another site →

The Leopoldville

• Leopoldville Troopship DisasterEnglishThe memorial site for the heaviest loss a Belgian ship was involved in: 763 American soldiers, Christmas Eve 1944. With eyewitness accounts and the roll of the dead.opens on another site →

The training ship Mercator

• HMS Mercator te Freetown, augustus 1943English · 1943A series of Imperial War Museum photographs, A 18846 to A 18859, taken aboard while the ship served as a floating rest home for submarine crews. The Royal Navy caption lists cold storage, electric light, fans, running water, radio sets and a special library.opens on another site →
• Zeilschip Mercator, museumschip te OostendeDutchThe ship has lain at Ostend as a museum ship since 1964 and can be visited. Aboard hangs, among other things, the British ensign she was given in 1945.opens on another site →

Further reading

• Aux officiers et marins belges de la marine marchande 1940-1945FrenchA French-language article on the Belgian merchant navy's officers and seamen in the war.opens on another site →
• Belgium WWIIDutchThe reference portal of the Belgian Centre for Historical Research on War and Society, covering Belgium in the Second World War, in three languages.opens on another site →
• VRT MAX — documentairesDutchThe documentary section of the Flemish public broadcaster. War material appears here from time to time; searching on a ship's name sometimes turns something up.opens on another site →
• The Belgian National Branch of the Royal Navy 1940-46English · 2025An article by Mark C. Jones in the British Journal for Military History, free to read. It sets out how the fleet was run from 11 May 1940 by the Belgian Shipping Advisory Committee at the London embassy, and how the Belgian Marine provided the gunners for the merchant ships.opens on another site →