Send Gift Baskets to Helchteren, Belgium

Remains from the Mesolithic and Neolithic have been found on Sonnisheide, dating from 10,000 to 8,000 BC. At the end of the 19th century, it was discovered that there was a treasure of Roman coins.

In the Middle Ages, Heilchteren was a separate seigniory. At the beginning of the 8th century, Pepijn van Herstal gave a large area in the Kempen to the Abbey of Sint-Truiden, including Helchteren. Saint Trudo Parish was founded sometime between 1107 and 1178.

He resided at Den Dool Castle, which served as a summer residence and, in troubled times, as a refuge for the abbot of the Abbey of Sint-Truiden. There were 127 hectares of land under the abbey here. The Count of Loon had exercised guardianship rights since the 13th century, but the abbot bought them off in 1281.

During the 13th and 14th centuries, mining operations began.

Robert van Craenwick, the then abbot, was sacked by knight Hendrik van Halbeek in 1361. Den Dool Castle was then set on fire by him. Helchteren was attacked again by him in March 1365, but the residents managed to defend themselves. Van Halbeek, however, returned on June 3, 1365, and set the church ablaze along with eight houses.

All kinds of troops were constantly making the region unsafe from 1615 onwards. The citizens requested the construction of a redoubt east of the castle on December 30, 1634, and it was only possible to find a trace of this redoubt by the end of the 18th century.

The village was attacked by the troops of John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, during the War of the Spanish Succession in 1707. Helchteren became an independent municipality in 1800 under the First French Republic after the French patriots arrived on December 5, 1792. During the Ten Days Campaign in 1831, the village had to deal with the (Dutch) government army battling the rebellious (Belgian) Maas army. In the end, William II’s army won the battle and advanced further, but after a French intervention toward Antwerp, it was forced to retreat.