Pierre Ryckmans (23 November 1891 – 18 February 1959), was a Belgian civil servant who served as Governor-General of Belgium's principal African colony, the Belgian Congo, between 1934 and 1946. Ryckmans began his career in the colonial service in 1915 and also spent time in the Belgian mandate of Ruanda-Urundi. His term as Governor-General of the Belgian Congo coincided with World War II in which he was instrumental in bringing the colony into the war on the Allied side after Belgium's defeat in May 1940. He was also a prolific writer on colonial affairs. He was posthumously created a peer of the realm in the Belgian nobility with the rank of count in 1962. Biography Early life Ryckmans was born in Antwerp in Flanders, Belgium, as the sixth child of Alphonse Ryckmans and Clémence Van Ryn. The Ryckmans family originally came from Mechelen where his ancestors were lawyers for two generations. His father Alphonse was a prominent member of the Catholic Party, a senator in the Belgian Senate, and city councillor. Ryckmans enrolled at the Catholic University of Leuven in Leuven to study philosophy. During his first year of studies he translated a novel by the Spanish writer Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. After two years of philosophy studies and one year of preparation for law school, he spent one more year in Braunfels, Germany (learning German), and then several months in Galway, Ireland (learning English), and then on the Aran Islands, where he learnt his sixth living language, Irish. He received his law degree in Leuven in 1913. World War I and Africa He had been called to the bar in Antwerp when World War I started. Volunteering for military service in August 1914, he spent the winter on the Yser Front, where he apparently enjoyed the camaraderie at the front, despite the hardships. But he had been drawn to Africa, even before the war, so he applied when Belgium wanted officers for overseas service in Belgian colonies. After a month and a half at Officers' School in September 1915, he left for Africa, first for Cameroon, then Kitega (the principal town of Urundi, present-day Burundi) where he arrived in August 1916. He was then posted to Mahenge in German East Africa (part of present-day Tanzania) in 1917, returning to Kitega in July 1918. He went on leave in 1920, and on 3 February 1920 married Madeleine Nève in Belgium. They