The commanders of the two regiments met in the market-place. Since no decisive result was possible without artillery against the enemy who were concealed in houses, cellars, and caves, and who were even firing from the cathedral, they resolved to gradually evacuate the town.
This was begun at about 3 o'clock in the afternoon.
Rifle-Fusilier Regiment No. 108.
The 3rd Battalion in its advance on Dinant had at once been fired at from the eastern houses. Nothing was to be seen of the enemy, although continuous firing came from the northern border of the Dinant-Gemechenne road valley. The farm of Malais was stormed by the 1st Battalion. The whole of the francs-tireurs who had resisted there were killed. According to its instructions, the battalion reached Leffe and Dinant under fire from the inhabitants. In the house of Dinant there were no longer any of the enemy forces either in uniform or provided with any military badges, but it was the fanatical population, even women, who fired on the troops. In the market-place there developed a brisk house-to-house fight. There was firing even from the tower of the cathedral. Almost all the houses were systematically defended. Both regimental commanders (of the 108th and 182nd Regiments) came to the conclusion that the Meuse could not be reached without the support of our artillery, and therefore ordered the return of the regiments at 3.30 in the afternoon. At 5 o'clock the bombardment of Dinant by our artillery began. On the following morning the brigade crossed the Meuse on the pontoon bridge at Leffe which was built by the 32nd Infantry Division, since it was impossible to march through burning Dinant.
Infantry Regiment No. 182.
During the advance of the regiment along the edge of a valley it received a continuous shrapnel fire from the western bank of the Meuse and infantry fire from the buildings and copses on the edge of the valley, causing losses. Captain Klotz, the leader of the machine-gun company, fell through a shot from above, apparently from one of the fortress-like watch-towers which stand there. Two battalions penetrated into Dinant and on towards the bridge, and received a detached fire from the houses and from the cliffs of the east bank, in numerous rocky caves of which francs-tireurs were hidden. At 5.30 in the evening the regiment stood again on the heights above Dinant while our artillery from the north furiously bombarded the town on both sides of the river.
In the evening and during the night enemy sharpshooters still continued to fire from the woods and buildings on the edge of the valley, which they had reached by passages in the rocks unknown to us, and into which they again disappeared.
C. App. 13.
Wood south-west of La Ville aux Bois, February 5th, 1915.
Deposition.