In the Line of Battle: Soldiers' Stories of the War

by Unknown

Did I see General Leman, the defender and hero of Liège? Oh, yes. General Leman was a good man. He came round and saw the soldiers and talked to us and made us happy.

I do not know how many we lost in Liège. We had a lot wounded and killed and missing; but we only knew this from the newspapers.

We were on duty in the trenches for twenty-four hours, then we were relieved. At the end of the twenty-four days for which we held Liège we went to Anden, ten miles away. We retired in the daytime, without any fighting, and were in Anden about fifteen days. We never saw the Germans there.

And now I became a motor cyclist, which gave me many adventures and exciting journeys. I was with a friend, a motor cyclist also, and we were reconnoitring near Anden. We saw a big house, a château, standing in its own grounds, with trees. They are beautiful and peaceful houses, and you saw many of them in Belgium before the war.

“There are some Germans here!” my friend said. We looked and listened, and what he said was true. There were Germans in the château, but how many in number we did not know.

We hurried away to our officer and told him, and he sent three companies of soldiers to attack the château. How well they marched up, and how from behind the trees and other points of shelter they fired upon that big house in the trees, with the Germans making themselves happy in it.

I and my friend had acted as guides to the companies, and now we saw the Belgian soldiers firing upon the château, and the surprised Germans rushing to the windows and doors and behind the trees to fire back.

It was a furious fight, and it lasted for two hours. Then we got the house—the Germans ran away, and we took it and occupied it. But next day the Germans came back in stronger numbers and retook the château; and the day after that we once more got the house and killed all the Germans. We knew that we could not hold it long, because we had not enough soldiers, and when we had been at the château for about four hours, and the Germans came up stronger than ever, we had to leave. We had not had many losses—two or three men killed. One was shot through the heart, and another was mortally wounded and lived a few hours.

There is a river at Anden, and when we retired we had to cross a bridge. When we had crossed the bridge we blew it up, so that the Germans should be delayed in pursuing us. Then, when we were retiring, and had seen the bridge destroyed, we were made unhappy because we saw that on the other side of the water, which was now the German side, there was a company of Belgian infantry, which could not cross.