Epilogue
The DeWitt Family
Albert DeWitt (1873-1946)
After retiring from his position of Supreme-General of the Army in 1924 at the age of 51, Albert DeWitt retired quietly to his home at Mirwart Castle in Saint-Hubert. Rather than simply rest on his laurels however, Albert began taking a more active role in the management of D&D Industrial, Belgium’s largest steel producer and one of its oldest and most powerful symbols of industry. Despite the tragic outcome of the war with Java, D&D Industrial, now renamed to Wallonia Steel, experienced impressive growth as a major supplier of armor plate and ordnance to the army and navy.
The company’s success continued under Albert’s management throughout the 1930s. In order to further develop, Wallonia Steel took an international dimension, acquiring several smaller companies in Britain. An offshoot in Brazil was even established in 1935 in order to take advantage of the emerging market there.
Following the outbreak of WWII and the fall of Belgium, Albert and his family moved to the United States where they lived with family until the end of the war. The war heavily affected steel production for Wallonia Steel, as many of the mills had been either destroyed or heavily damaged. The company’s mainland holdings had been temporarily absorbed into Friedrich Krupp AG during the war.
Shortly after returning to Belgium, Albert DeWitt suffered a massive stroke and died, leaving the company to his only son, Michel.
Michel DeWitt (1909-1992)
Michel DeWitt was a graduate of Harvard University, a soldier serving in both Africa during the Sokoto insurgency and the Second World War, a business man, and a writer. After graduating from Harvard in three years he fought for Belgium in Africa, an experience which he recorded in a bestselling book,
War in the Dark Continent. Not long after he was discharged, he began working at Wallonia Steel, establishing the company’s offshoot in Brazil.
He returned to Belgium just a few months before the start of WWII, where he married Carmen Miranda, a Portuguese Brazilian performer. He joined the Belgian army as a lieutenant and fought until the fall of France, after which he returned to Brazil to manage the company there. During this time he and his wife had two daughters, Alice and Marie, in 1942 and 1944 respectively. With his father’s sudden death in 1946, he returned to Belgium once more to take the reins as CEO of Wallonia Steel and begin the long process of rebuilding.
Rebuilding proved difficult over the next few decades as a result of competition with the relatively unscathed US steel producers, but thanks to the company’s holdings in Britain and Brazil, they fared better than most. Wallonia Steel managed to experience exceptional annual growth as its steel was put to use rebuilding the country. In 1956, Michel DeWitt was the highest-paid executive in all of Belgium. While growth eventual began to slow as competition with developing countries like China increased, Wallonia Steel proved capable of adapting and continued to show strong profits almost every year.
In 1984, Michel DeWitt retired from the company at the age of 75, leaving his younger daughter, Marie, to take over as CEO. In 1992 Michel passed away quietly in his sleep.
Marie DeWitt (1944)
Given the DeWitt family’s 91% ownership of the company, in 1995 Marie was easily able to begin a takeover and merger of ARBED, a global economic actor and steel producer out of Luxembourg. The newly formed company was renamed to DeWitt Steel and became one of the largest steel producers in the world. As of 2014, it is ranked 104 in the Fortune Global 500 of the world’s biggest corporations and employs more than 230,000 people all over the world.