However, the night of November 5 was quiet all round Dixmude; but at dawn the attack was renewed. This time we had good reason to hope for success. Rising from the provisional trenches, our battalions moved simultaneously in echelon across the plain. The charge sounded, shouts of "Vive la France!" broke out, and, in spite of terrible machine-gun and rifle fire, the farm and the park were carried with a rush. Our men were at the foot of the Château. But there the rush was stopped. Contrary to report, the Château was not taken. The internal defences had been organised in the most formidable way, perhaps even before the war began. The enemy left in our hands some hundred prisoners, who had been barricaded in the pavilion at the main gate.[60] At nightfall the order was given to retire. The De Jonquières battalion returned to its billets. The 42nd Division went off in another direction,[61] and the brigade was again left alone at Dixmude with a handful of Senegalese and the Belgians.[62] [Illustration: (Newspaper Illustrations) THE "KIEKENSTRAAT" (CHICKEN STREET) AFTER THE FIRST DAYS OF THE BOMBARDMENT] "We don't budge," writes De Nanteuil on November 6. "Our reinforcements are being sent back. Visited the church and Hôtel de Ville of Dixmude. Frightful! They are nothing but shapeless ruins. There is not a whole house left. Certain quarters are destroyed down to their very foundations; they are nothing but heaps of stone and bricks.... Messina is in better case than this unhappy town." FOOTNOTES: [59] Declaration of the Abbé Vanryckeghem, who affirms that the _curés_ of Saint Georges, of Mannekensverke, and of Vladsloo were also executed. [60] This, however, is not certainly established. For this account of the closing scenes of the attack we have followed the narrative of the correspondent of _La Liberté_, which appeared to us trustworthy. This correspondent says, "They [the prisoners] had no time to retreat, so sudden and furious was the attack. Carried away by their excitement, the Marines never saw that the pavilion was full of Germans. It was not until three hours later that a Prussian non-commissioned officer walked unarmed out of the building and surrendered with his party to the first French officer he met." We have been authoritatively told that nothing of the kind took place. "The attack reached the Château, but failed to carry it."