"The medical service was perfect. The service of burying was extremely faulty. The grave-diggers did not trouble about the Belgian dead, leaving them to be buried by the inhabitants. Needless to say they were robbed."
As regards Lieutenant d'Ursel, I knew he had been wounded under the left temple, but I heard that he was dead when I was at St. Trond. According to information that I received, when the body of this officer of the Guides was identified, he was wounded in the face and heart.
From this account, we see that the Germans attacked the Budingen bridge with considerable forces, that the two Squadrons of Guides resisted with the greatest bravery, and that, in compliance with their instructions, they defended to the uttermost the passage of the Gette. To my deep regret, I was obliged to leave Lieutenant d'Ursel on the battle-field. But I affirm that, at the time I left him, he had only one wound in the head and that if he was wounded afterwards in the heart, he had been killed when wounded, in contempt of the laws of warfare.
Aerschot
(August 19, 1914)
From the Report of Captain Commander Gilson, commanding the 4th Company of the 1st Battalion of the 9th Line Regiment
The Belgian Army, two Corps strong, had held its observation position from the 5th to the 18th of August. It had resisted the attacks of the enemy cavalry and light troops. When attacked by eleven enemy Corps and three Cavalry Divisions, about 500,000 men, supported by 600 machine-guns and 1800 cannons, it fell back on Antwerp. A lively rear-guard action took place between the 11th German Corps and the 9th and 14th Line Regiments in the direction of Aerschot.