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Updated: June 26, 2025
Only a few shells were bursting over the Belgian lines enough to keep the air rumbling with irregular thunderclaps. But as we approached the corner where we had waited for news of de Broqueville one of these shells burst very close to us and ploughed up a big hole in a field across the roadside ditch. We drove more swiftly with empty cars and came into the streets of Dixmude.
Then Lieutenant de Broqueville spoke a word of command. "The first ambulance must now get back." I was with the first ambulance, in Gleeson's company. We had a full load of wounded men and we were loitering. I put my head outside the cover and gave the word to the chauffeur. As I did so a shrapnel bullet came past my head, and, striking a piece of ironwork, flattened out and fell at my feet.
Lieutenant de Broqueville was earnestly requested not to lead his little column into unnecessary risks, especially as it was difficult to know the exact position of the enemy until reports came in from the field officers. It was astonishing as it is always in war to find how soldiers quite near to the front are in utter ignorance of the course of a great battle.
It was only after the Agadir coup and Algeciras that M. de Broqueville, Minister of War, strongly supported by King Albert, was able to carry through a Bill introducing general and compulsory service, which would have placed the army on a proper footing if its provisions had been rendered immediately effective.
These words were uttered for the first time, I believe, by the Belgian Premier, Baron de Broqueville, in the solemn sitting of the House, when the German violation of Belgian neutrality was announced to the representatives of the people. The idea is supposed to have been expressed by King Albert, in another form, before the evacuation of Antwerp.
Then we saw the gleam of headlights, and an English voice called out. Our two friends had come back. They had gone to the entry of Dixmude, but could get no further owing to the flames and shells. They, too, had waited for an hour, but had not found de Broqueville. It seemed certain that he was dead, and very sorrowfully, as there was nothing to be done, we drove back to Furnes.
It seemed very strange to be sitting down to table with cheerful faces about me. But some of the faces were not cheerful. Those of us who knew of the disappearance of de Broqueville sat silently over our soup. Then suddenly there was a sharp exclamation of surprise of sheer amazement and Lieutenant de Broqueville came walking briskly forward, alive and well. ... It seemed a miracle.
I watched him walk erect where even the renowned fighting men of an allied race were stooping and hiding, because he held his life as nothing when there were wounded to be rescued. I saw Lieutenant Robert de Broqueville, son of the prime minister of Belgium, go into Dixmude on the afternoon when the town was leveled by German guns.
Yet it did not give me any warmth at that moment. Dr. Munro and Lieutenant de Broqueville mounted the steps of the Town Hall, followed by another brancardier and myself. Gleeson was already taking down a stretcher. He had a little smile about his lips. A French officer and two men stood under the broken archway of the entrance between the fallen pillars and masonry.
We managed to take some of these on board. They were less quiet than the others we had, and groaned in a heartrending way. And then, a little later, we made a painful discovery. Lieutenant de Broqueville, our gallant young leader, was missing. By some horrible mischance he had not taken his place in either of the ambulances or the motor-car. None of us had the least idea what had happened to him.
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