The first observation cabin having been demolished by gun fire, on April
the 4^{th} 1917, a new one in concrete took its place, the upper trench
became a platform, the liaison and signal post provided with ground
telegraphy. The automatic rifles and bomb throwers multiplied.
The Death Trench was provided with an alternative straight communication
line. A light wooden railway track was layed, to enable transport and
evacuation by means of the small trucks. Numerous “concrete-brick”
shelters were created.
Finally the head of the trench was turned into a deathtrap, surrounded
by wolf’s holes and barbed wires, that point was only manned by day time
by snipers sheltered in a small concrete sentry box.
The trap was separated from the death trench by a monolithe concrete
dug-out of a rather peculiar shape. That shelter was fitted with a heavy
steel door, and loopholed to enable hand grenade throwing and automatic
rifle’s firing. A vibrating connected the little redoubt with the
Commander of the “Cavalier”.
In case that the enemy managed to enter the trap or to reach our trench,
the garrison of the fortlet was to shut itself up in it and resist from
within during a length of time sufficient to be relieved by a
counter-attack delivered by the “Cavalier” which had been alerted by the
buzzer.
During the Franco-British offensive of October 1917 numerous fires were
carried out by our artillery to prepare the eventual cooperation of the
Belgian forces. That artillery action brought on to us energetic
retaliations which did a lot of damages to the line at Roode-Poort.
The numerous raids of our troops in the German lines proved the
efficiency of our fire, which had reduced the enemy’s trenches to mere
ruins.
When the 1917 offensive was stopped the life resumed its normal and dull
course; the 5^{th} infantry division was set at work to repair the
damages and restore to our positions their former power.
Our attack of September 1918 had a repercussion upon the whole sector
overlooked by the Cavalier.
The first battle had brought the Belgian Army on the Clercken ridge. The
intention to hinge the new front to the old one including the Dixmude
town, induced the 5^{th} line Regiment to get hold of Trench “One”,
“111”, as well as of the first work North of Dixmude. And this was to be
the only alteration brought on the front round kilometer 16.
From the 15^{th} to the 17^{th} of October, under the victorious onrush
of the second battle, the front was split up from Nieuport to Dixmude
and the Germans were compelled to a hurried retreat.
The front of the Yser was definitively cleared, the Rider and the Death
Trench had ended their glorious mission.
It is important to note the powerful organizations of the enemy, facing
the “Death Trench”, notably the enormous concrete of German sap-heads on
the leftbank of the Yser, with their iron-plated loopholes and firing
ranges, overlooking all the surrounding districts.
The Rider is a work of the greatest interest. It may be considered as a
small museum concerning the trench warfare. In the minimum space it
utilized in a most judicious way all defensive and offensive implement
such as accessory defences and all kinds of liaison systems, which were
coordinated to bring the highest efficiency.
It was also the witness of the magnificent and sustained stoïcism on the
part numerous Belgian soldiers who succeeded each other to defend it.
The Death Trench is a sacred spot, sacred by the acts of courage and
heroism that were accomplished there, and sacred by the blood that was
shed here, it is the tomb of hundreds of brave heroes.
14.—Company commander’s post near the Yserdam, at Dixmude, in front of
the canal of Handzaeme (leftbank).
16.—Concrete dug-out south of the railway bridge at Dixmude (left bank).
These two shelters mark out the portion of the Belgian front which
suffered the most by German bombardment with trench-mortars shells and
bombs.
During the dreadful days of May 1916, our first line, facing Dixmude was
subjected to awful firing; the embankment of the Yser, behind which our
men were sheltered, was overthrown, the shelters broken down, the relief
posts destroyed. All the work of the trenches which had taken eighteen
months of patient toil to erect was annihilated in a few days and
transformed into a horrible chaos. Hundreds of brave soldiers were torn
to pieces by the bursting of German trench mortar shells, the effects of
which were so terrible that in falling they dug craters of 10 meters
diameter, thus smashing up the strongest shelters, and crushing and
burying under the ruins all those who had taken refuge there. After the
storm calmed down (and it was only calmed when our mortars arrived,
affording us then the opportunity to juggle with those of the
adversary), the Belgian soldiers with their habitual tenacity, undertook
to rebuild their defensive works. Night and day, they worked patiently
and obstinately on, and in the face of the enemy which was watching them
from the opposite side of the bank, managed ruins out of the ruins that
were accumulated there, to erect new lines of defence, stronger and
better established than the first. They were composed, besides firing
parapets for infantrymen, of numerous shelters for snipers and
machine-gunners, rest and waiting shelters, relief posts, fighting
battle posts for unit commanders, etc.... Earth, wood, iron, concrete,
all were put together and used to constitute a formidable entrenched
line, which was held till the end of the war.
From amongst these numerous shelters, two have been preserved: the first
at the South of the Bridge-rail of Dixmude, is situated in the centre of
the bend formed by the Yser in front of the town. The second was used as
a fighting post for the commander of the company entrusted to defend the
portion of the embankment, situated in front of the Handzaeme Canal.
That particular point was specially momentous and to be watched, because
it meant there to forbid the inroad in our lines of the Germans troops,
which, under the cover of the Handzaeme canal banks, could, mounted on
little boats berthed at Dixmude, try a landing on the West bank of the
river Yser.
15.—The Flour-Mill of Dixmude.
How can one recall the battle of Dixmude without having before one’s
eyes the vision of the flour-mill rising far above the ruins of the
little Flemish town? One saw it in spite of oneself; in fact nearly
always one felt its presence. During the four years of trench warfare it
was the vigilant eye watch of the enemy. An eye with a look of fire and
iron. An eye which had the command over powerful artillery, over
numerous minenwerfers, and even over simple snipers who coldly struck
down the imprudent and foolhardy ones who ventured to brave it, very
often without being aware of it.
At the beginning of the war, a legend ran that the massif construction
of the corn-mill was built by the Germans. The authorised opinion of E.
Hosten in his book entitled _the Agony of Dixmude_ gives the lie to this
assertion in the following terms: “It is quite evident at the present
day that the platform of the huge cube of cement which formed the
corn-mill of Dixmude was not erected on the shore of the Yser, solely to
receive heavy German artillery which from that matchless observatory
could have overlooked and swept-away all the surroundings”.
During the tragic days of the battle of the Yser (from the 17^{th} to
the 31^{st} of October 1914) the bridge-head, created round Dixmude was
preserved in spite of the many furious assaults of the enemy. It was the
witness each day, each hour even, of incredible and superhuman tenacity
and endurance on the part of the Belgian and French troops. Those brave
soldiers were commanded by energetic, resolute and iron willed chiefs,
whose fame has long classed them among the most accomplished men of the
war. Let us suffice to mention the celebrated and famous names of
Ronarch, Meiser and Jacques.
[Illustration:
DIXMUDE.—The flour-mill (La minoterie) in 1916.
]
[Illustration:
DIXMUDE. The flour-mill (La minoterie) in 1917.
]
The corn-mill, in this position acted the double part of observatory and
shelter for the defensive reserves. An observer connected with Colonel
De Vleeschouwer, who was in command of the Belgian artillery in front of
Dixmude, could, while placed on the platform of the building, direct the
firing on all telling points, such as batteries of the enemy in action,
troops on the march, preparations for attacks, etc....
The enemy did not allow our artillery such an advantage for long; the
corn-mill was partly taken by the German batteries, which took great
pleasure in directing blazing fires on that colossal building. The
observer was forced to abandon his post, but nevertheless not without
the satisfaction of having registered to the best advantage and
conditions the first fires of our artillery.
The corn-mill, from that time, was simply utilized as the nest for the
reserves of the bridge-head. A company, to which a platoon was sometimes
added, composed its garrison.
⁂
The night of the 25^{th} to the 26^{th} of October 1914 was marked, in
the resistance of Dixmude, by a unique and singular incident.
In the evening of the 25^{th}, groups of Germans had managed to creep
into the intervening spaces of the trenches, situated between the
railway line of Zarren and the road leading to Eessen, trenches which
were guarded by troops physically exhausted, whose lines were
considerably weakened by ten days of cruel and outrageous fighting.
These groups of enemies formed themselves up again inside our lines. The
night was as black as ink, and unfortunately the guns on the road of
Eessen were jammed.
As soon as Lieutenant Simon of the 12^{th} line was informed of the
incident by one of his men, he immediately directed an intensive fire on
the Germans, putting a great number out of the field. The others
reformed on the road. They were about three hundred. Headed by the Major
and accompanied by an enervating music of fifes, they penetrated in the
town, firing on all lited points, such as fighting posts, shelters for
troops, relief posts, killing and capturing on their passage all small
and isolated groups of French and Belgian soldiers who were taken
prisoners and forced to march in front to serve as shields.
Thanks to this infamous trick the German column arrived without incident
as far as the bridge road. The latter was crossed by the allied soldiers
followed up by the Germans, the Major included. The machine-gunners of
the bridge only perceived their mistake when a hundred pick helmets had
already passed over. They then opened a muzzle to muzzle fire on the
rest of the column which went whirling over and was scattered in the
town, leaving numerous dead and wounded on the pavement.
In the meanwhile the troops of the bridge-head were living the most
thrilling moments of the battle. Nevertheless though much unnerved, they
were maintained at their post, thanks to the marvelous calm and heroical
energy of the officers who examined and rectified the occupation of the
trenches.
And then, what an unutterable relief to the troops and their chiefs when
they heard the guns firing on the bridge road proclaiming loudly that
the line of the Yser still held good and that it had not been taken
unawares!
Till dawn, the front of the bridge-head had to face at the same time,
the positions of the enemy, and the town. It was not necessary. The
Germans who had crossed the bridge, marched on at random. At a little
distance at the East of the halt at Caeskerke, they soon ran up against
a company of the 12^{th} of the line in reserve. (The C. P. of the
admiral was composed of a group of cyclist carabiniers re-enforced by
their runners). Without fighting the enemy detachment turned South
across the fields, and fell, without knowing, on our batteries and would
have surprised them without help when fortunately the detachment was
taken between the fires of several groups of French and Belgian soldiers
and was encircled without difficulty. Not quick enough though, to
prevent the said detachment of committing the most abominable crime: the
massacre without mercy and without distinction of their prisoners.
Taken prisoners in their turn, the Germans could have been judged
according to the regulations and an avalanche of shot would have
sufficed to have stretched them out. But we were struggling for the
Right; brought before Admiral Ronarch, he decided to have executed
militarily the Germans who had shown themselves the most cruel in the
massacre; three amongst these, recognized by the Belgian doctor Van der
Ghinst, who had been taken prisoner during the night, and had escaped by
miracle, were shot on the spot, the others were sent to the back.
As for the part of the German column which had not been able to cross
the bridge, this was taken under the fires of the guns, and was, as we
have already said, dispersed in all directions, endeavouring to seek
refuge in the houses at Dixmude. The reserve garrisoned in the flour
mill, awaken by the noise of the fighting and being at once acquainted
with the situation, remained in place, ready to intervene.
The Germans, who tempted to take refuge in the corn-mill were shot down
without ceremony, and at daylight patrols were sent in the town to
search the houses, and arrest all those who were hidden there. The
nightmare was ended, and confidence revived more than ever.
This trick of the Germans, which might have figured in their war annals,
as a glorious page, simply lengthened the list of their crimes. On the
other hand, it set of more than ever the admirable qualities of the
French and Belgian armies: the confidence of the troops in their chiefs,
their character and above all their generosity perhaps somewhat
exaggerated when addressed to individuals deformed by a barbarous
“Kultur”.
The action of the bridge-head ended with the battle of the Yser, the
1^{st} of November 1914; anyhow for reasons purely moral, it was still
kept there. The occupying troops were reduced.
The defensive artillery was also reduced in too large proportions owing
to the reason that a great quantity of pieces had been disabled,
moreover the munitions were deficient. Many empty ammunition limbers
could not be replenished, already for several days the wants surpassed
the means of supply.
The days of the 9^{th} and 10^{th} of November 1914 marked out the agony
of Dixmude which began by a general bombardment of great violence, to
which our twenty guns of 7c5, with only the aid of a few heavy french
guns, could but attempt a retaliation.
The 3^d battalion of the 1^{st} line regiment and two battalions of
Singalese kept the bridge-head.
The 10^{th}, about 7 o’clock, a first German assault failed before our
lines, to the great astonishment of the enemy who was convinced that he
had annihilated all our defences.
His plan of attack had to be completely altered. The XXII^{th} army
corps of reserve was charged with this mission. Three convergent columns
took the South and East sectors as though in pincers. The artillery
carried on an infernal fire, casting and sowing death in the trenches,
in the town and on all accessible roads to our reserves.
The South sector resisted, the East one also, but unfortunately a
portion of the trench, situated between the railway line and the road,
and only guarded by the dead and wounded could no longer keep back the
enemy who rushed the position and took it back handed. Then began a most
terrific fight, the memory of which makes the ancients shudder. It was a
serie of hand to hand fights, individual fights with the bayonet in the
streets, in the houses, in the trenches, leaving on the ground at every
step, the blood of the vanquisher as well as the vanquished.
Unfortunately the admiral disposes of no reserves at hand. He cannot
untrim the bank of the Yser which will have to face the attack if
continued, and endeavour to bar the crossing of the river.
And that is why under the pressure of numbers and after several hours of
bloody struggle, the defenders of the bridge-head were forced to
concentrate themselves in the corn-mill and in the trench preceding it.
During several hours it is a resistance, where the resolute and
determined courage of a few men, held the head to a numerous enemy which
was struck down in heaps.
In the meantime, the bridging company had placed a foot bridge across
the Yser at the western side of the corn-mill thus permitting the last
defenders of Dixmude to cross the river, sheltered from the front fires
of the infantry.
All our men re-entered the corn-mill. The order for the general retreat
arrived. It was four o’clock p. m.
With heavy hearts, those brave troops who had fought like lions and who
were determined to the last sacrifice leave their fortress of one day
cast a last look on the smoking ruins of the town, on the corn-mill,
which in its turn begins to burn (the fire was set during the defence by
a french soldier), send a last and pious thought to all the gallant
heroes who have just bravely fallen for their country, and the river is
crossed.
Twenty-two officers and a large number of soldiers were missing at the
roll call on the left bank.
The German attack attempts again the passage of the Yser, but it is
annihilated. The artillery thunders, all the time, but the infantry
holds, and will hold till the end.
Thus were the last spasms of the battle of the Yser, and the trench
warfare begins.
⁂
The Germans occupied Dixmude and the corn-mill. Our first line was
staked out on the West of the Yser. From one end to the other, positions
were organized, fortified and armed according to the constant progress
of the science of the new war, which transformed the sectors into real
fortresses, whose smallest corners hid instruments of death.
The corn-mill did not escape German organization. Strong, it was
already, but it was rendered undestroyable. The walls were used as lock
ups for tons of concrete in the midst of which were disposed a series of
shelters and posts of observation, which had nothing to fear even from
the most enormous projectiles.
The corn-mill was a source of great suffering to our troops, not only by
the watchmen, but by the minenwerfers that it sheltered. Our artillery
made many desperate attempts to attack it. It only managed to round its
cubic forms and to pulverize certain points of its bulk, but that was
all.
⁂
During the Franco-British offensive from August to October 1917, our
staff thought, at a certain moment to be able to extend on our front the
progression of the Allies. It was at the time of the long artillery
preparations. Our batteries, re-enforced by numerous guns of heavy
calibre of the allied armies, executed a systematic hammering on the
enemy’s front, which after a few days enabled us to believe that the
works of the enemy had been absolutely and thoroughly annihilated.
It was decided to ascertain and see the state of the upheaval.
Consequently raids were undertaken on all the beaten front. They were a
great success, except at the flour-mill.
On the nights of the 28^{th} to 29^{th} of October, on the 3^d and
4^{th} of November 1917, detachments of the 5^{th} and 6^{th} of the
line regiment crossed the Yser with magnificent spirit. The South and
North trenches of the flour-mill were cleaned out without great
difficulty, but when the detailed group attacked the flour-mill, there
was a reaction, and a painful one which cost the life to many a brave
man, a reaction which proved once more, the power of inactive and inert
substance against which courage is nothing. Through their invisible loop
holes and under the thick armour of their shelters immersed in concrete,
the few occupants of the flour-mill soon overpowered the will and
determination of our troops, who were forced to retreat taking away with
them their dead and wounded.
The Franco-British offensive could not be continued for several reasons,
and our army resumed the life of the trenches which still lasted another
year.
At last there was the liberating offensive.
The rapid progress of our troops forced the enemy to abandon Dixmude.
Our soldiers entered there the 29^{th} of September 1918 and settled
there till the 15^{th} of October, date of the second rush forward.
The town was nothing but a heap of ruins and the flour-mill a grey
shapeless mass, which will perpetuate the remembrance of this long war
and the numerous heroes fallen there under its blows.
17.—Albert and Elisabeth Redoubts.
18.—The Joconde’s dwelling.
19.—Battalion commander’s Headquarters (all between kilom. 19 and 20 of
Yser river, left bank).
The fighting posts and shelters established after the battle of the
Yser, in the ruins of the small buildings along the embankment, saw
little by little their walls relined with a strong interior casing of
concrete, and their lost roofs, replaced by thick concrete layers also.
The house of the Joconde (so called, because of the good old
proprietress, Mieke Bœuf, who during long weeks of trench warfare still
occupied it and who became quite legendary with our soldiers), served as
a lodging to the Commander of the company at the bridge-head, till a
better appropriated shelter was built. It was occupied after, by the men
of the Royal engineers, who were charged to keep in good order, the foot
bridges giving access to the bridge-head.
The next house to the one of the Joconde’s served as C. P. to the major
on guard.
After the organization of the bridge-head (see notice n^o 20), an
allround plan fortifying the sector was elaborated. They foresaw the
construction of little forts or redoubts with a distance of 600 meters
between each and utilizing the embankment as a parapet and the Yser as
obstacle.
It was with the redoubts Albert and Elisabeth that they began. They were
finished in December 1915. The reason of their existence, was to protect
the bridge-head against enfilading fire; but that was not the only part
they played. These two redoubts completed and formed with the part of
the embankment which bound them together a kind of curtain which had to
hold good, whatever happened.
The system and assemblage of fires which shot out from the numerous loop
holes and “embrasures” of their shelters for machine-guns and rifles
gave them an enormous capacity of resistance.
The redoubts Albert and Elisabeth were the work of the engineers of 2^d
army division.
20.—The Bridge-Head at kilometer 19.500 (Right Bank).
When the Belgian front was stabilized (November 1914), it was in part
covered by floods, before which our posts soon became powerful
main-guards.
Two well distinctive floods had been spread; the first during the battle
of the Yser, was extended between the river and the railway line
Nieuport-Dixmude having the paved road Oostkerke kilometer 16 of the
Yser as Southern limit; the second, subsequent to the fall of Dixmude
was created at the request of the French troops from the 14^{th} of
November 1914. All the land situated at the East of the Yser, between
the Houtensluisvaart and the road embankment of Knocke to Drie Grachten
was flooded (this was realised, thanks to the great difference of water
level of the two river-banks. The one on the right bank being inferior
to the one on the left).
Between the kilometer 16 of the Yser and Houtensluisvaart the obstacle
of water did not exist. The enemy, at Dixmude occupied the right bank of
the Yser, which alone separated the adversary lines. At the South of the
railway line of Dixmude to Zarren, the German positions followed a
course almost parallel to the road of Woumen, comprising the strongly
organized points such as the cemetery of Dixmude, the Castle of
kilometer 19 and several farms. Our troops continued to follow the left
bank of the river.
After the victory of the Yser, the constant idea of our staff was to
reconquer the most ground possible. The Belgian army built on all
practicable spots; posts of various degrees of importance, and this
principle was applied to the sector of Nieucappelle on a very large
scale.