Son Receives Father’s Kachabia After 68 Years

Why this is here: Slimane Laïchour preserved the kachabia for 68 years, keeping it hidden under the roof tiles of his home to protect it from the French colonial army.

Noureddine Aït Hamouda, son of Algerian War hero Colonel Amirouche, received a kachabia—a traditional striped wool garment—belonging to his father at the El Moudjahid museum in Tizi-Ouzou, Algeria. The kachabia had been kept safe by Slimane Laïchour, a fellow fighter with the National Liberation Army, since 1958. Laïchour, now 91 years old, recounted how the garment accompanied Amirouche through difficult terrain during the war.

The kachabia appears in few existing photos of Amirouche, nicknamed “The Lion of the Soummam” by the French colonial army. Laïchour hid the garment under the roof tiles of his family home to protect it from colonial forces. He gave it to Amirouche in 1958 to shield him from the elements while fighting in the mountains.

Noureddine Aït Hamouda, 76, was visibly moved while accepting the kachabia, embracing it as if greeting his father, who died when Noureddine was ten. The garment’s origins remain unknown, and its story is incomplete, yet it now resides in a museum as a reminder of the Algerian War.