FIGHTING IN BELGIUM.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 196, 27 January 1915, Page 6

FIGHTING IN BELGIUM.

WATER BARRIER TO THE COAST. HOW THE GERMANS WERE FOILED. The flglit for ir.o last strip of Belgian coast has brought into sudden fame an unassuming Belgian citizen "who never sought notoriety, but, in a simple effort to do his duty, showed the Belgian Army Stall' how to bring a great disaster on the German army 1 without the loss'of a single Belgian soldier or round of ammunition. This citizen called in nature's forces against the most perI feet military machine of man's contrivance, and nature won. The citizen was he who planned the flooding of the Gerf man position on the Yser. He lias since ' been decorated with the Order of King Leopold. He is a keeper of the great sluices at Nieuport, which control the water in the canals and dykes, and consequently had an intimate knowledge of the possibilities of flooding the country. 1 At the beginning of November the Germans were fighting furiously to get a footing on the western side of the river Yser, which was held by the Belgian army. By superhuman efforts, and at a cost of thousands of German lives, they managed to get a footing on the western side of the little river. The position they gained was important; a serious breach in the allied front was threatened; the Belgian army had to fall | back/

It was at this juncture of events that the modest sluice keeper came forward. For the last 20 miles or so of its course the river Yser is canalised and embanked. The water level is several feet above most of the surrounding country. The sluice keeper pointed out to the Belgian Army Staff that by using the railway embankment as a dyke and by breaking the canal bank in certain places, most of the region in which the German trenches and advanced gun positions lay would be covered with water. His plan was at once adopted. The culverts in the railway embankments were dammed, and then the fire of the heavy guns was concentrated on certain points of the canal bank till it burst, and the water spread out over the fields below it. The result was stupendous. The waters rushed over the flat country with incredible rapidity. In a few hours the whole region from Nieuport to Dixnmda, and between the Yser and the railway embankment, was under water. The Germans were compelled to fall back, leaving behind many guns and commissariat waggons. Whole companies of their troops, chiefly Wurtembergers, were drowned. The Germans hastily ro'treatingl in inexplicable muddle from ' the advancing floods, were vigorously j shelled by British and French artillery. iThe British' naval guns worked great havoc in the ranks of the scrambling, water-logged Germans, hastily deserting ; their flooded trenches.

In spite of this bitter lesson, the, Germans, with foolhardy courage, made another effort further south, and actually f did succeed in crossing the bridges over the river and the branches connecting the Yser with Ypres. Their object was t'o cut off the British army, holding Ypres, on that side. They thought they had succeeded. But once again the Belgian Army Staff conferred with the worthy sluice, keeper. Once more the sluices were opened, and nature won. The Germans had to beat a rapid retreat before the floods. There was some fierce fighting in the retreat. ' French mitrailleuses predominated, because heavy gnus could not be employed on the marshy ground, and, indeed, many of the German guns were swamped. At. some places hand-to-hand fighting was carried on in the water. The soldiers in many cases were completely exhausted by the cold and exposure in their wet clothes. There was heavy slaughter of the enemy One German regiment was entirely destroyed.

The second inundation was worse tiiis.li the first. Tt coincided with a fierce storm of vain and sleet, and a northeasterly sale drove the Hood waters before it fit a rapid rate towards the fiovninn lines. The bridgehead at Dixmud-'. obtained by the Germans with heavy toll of life, soon became untenable, because of the rushing waters. The (Jennan?, sullenly retreating, were exposed to a severe shell fire from the Allies' guns. They suffered terrible distress from fire and water. The waters rose rapidly,

and the retreating Germans were drowned in hundreds. Many of them were trapped in the to]) stories of houses in which they had taken refuge from the rising floods. Out of the llood isolated hillocks appeared, and these swarmed with dripping, sodden, cold, and miserable German troops, who were picked ofT by the Allies' guns or surrendered en masse. On the rising tide floated corpses; the fenland became a lake of the dead. "The country," says an eye-witness of the dreadful scene, "from Nieuport to llixmude, and to lesser extent, the country for some considerable distance south of the latter place, has been turned into a horrible open sewer, in which innumerable bod'es are lloatiug, and abandoned guns and ammunition are submerged. The new inundated area stretches from Dixumde to within a few miles of Bix"clioote. which means that from the sand dunes on the Belgian sea shore, nearly all the way to Ypres the Germans find that route to Calais blocked bv water.