Stop! A hiker on a path! Do you see me standing there? A stump! No branches protect me from the rain and the snow. Only a cover, black, like the dark thoughts that beset me when I think of former splendours.
Imagine: once – it was barely 150 years ago – there was no forest here. You saw only heath and wasteland.
Because people needed wood, they gradually cut everything down: they produced charcoal and heated blast furnaces to make iron. For one wagonful of iron, they needed 36 wagonfuls of wood. They warmed themselves on cold days by the fire…
But no one had the idea of planting new trees. Even the self-seed was grazed away by the sheep, goats, cattle, and pigs that were herded here. One day the forest was gone. Rain washed out the unprotected barren soil. Wasteland arose. The people of the Eifel were plagued by hunger and hardship.
So be wise, wanderer, and learn from this: don’t be driven by the ‘now’ alone! Think of the roots. If they are missing, there is barrenness. Remember: you need trees to breathe, to live, not just to have.
Back then, 150 years ago, the Prussians came. They were the new owners of the ‘Attenborns’, as the local people call the area. In 1859, the Prussians said: ‘We need to plant new trees. Not beech and oak, but spruce, which thrives even on barren soil.’ The people fought back. They did not want to lose their grazing land. They contemptuously called it ‘the Prussian tree’, and attempted to pull out the saplings at night, which then had to be protected by policemen and soldiers.
So be wise, wanderer, and learn from this: sometimes you have to say goodbye to the familiar for the sake of the future.
I was lucky and didn’t get pulled out. Neither was my offshoot. We continued to grow. Belgians then owned the Attenborn. At the beginning of 1930, they decided to cut 5000 cubic metres of timber out of the Attenborn to finance the construction of the new church in Medell. I was trembling and thought, this is my downfall. Yet, they spared me, left me standing, in memory of those of my confreres who had contributed to the construction of the new church by selling their wood. And they had learned. New spruces were planted. As you can see, they now stand in all their glory around my stump.
I was allowed to continue to grow with the boys, and have now grown to a proud 11 cubic metres of wood. My circumference increased (4.15 metres; diameter: 1.32 metres), my height too (38.3 metres). I was visible from afar, even to the lightning that struck and destroyed me in 2014.
Now, you may ask, why was the stump left standing and not removed? I’ll tell you, hiker:
It is a reminder of the past. Also of the fragility of the past! But lessons learned help to secure the future. Remember: it is that of your children.
This story should remind you of the past and be a lesson for the future. It should also be a reminder of the many people who keep history alive in East Belgium, who make it a ‘memo-rial’ to possibly initiate something for the future. They help to ensure that ‘memo-rials’ are not plunged into the realm of oblivion, out of fear of remembering or because remembering is painful.
Engelbert Cremer
Medell