The troops were, however, too much involved in house-to-house fighting to be immediately withdrawn. It was only after 3 o'clock in the afternoon that it was possible to withdraw the troops to the heights north of Dinant, so that the artillery, in particular, sections of Field Artillery Regiment No. 12 and a battery of heavy artillery, could now bring Dinant, from Leffe, more effectually under their fire (Apps. 12, 19, 21). In the early morning Infantry Regiment No. 178 had set out from Thynes on their march towards Leffe, making use of the Leffe valley road. Already before reaching Leffe the advance company was fired on from detached holdings as well as from the steep hill slopes (partially wooded), which stretched along on the right and the left of the road. This harassing fire was directed with particular activity from the paper-mill situated on the left of the road and the adjacent houses. For this reason, the slopes were searched for francs-tireurs, later on with the co-operation of the 11th Jägers, and the barricaded houses forcibly opened and cleared of inhabitants. All those caught with weapons in their hands were shot. More and more vigorously the advancing regiment was attacked by the inhabitants concealed in the houses. There was firing from all the houses, although in many of them no one was found. The marksmen crept into their hiding-places in order to leave them later on and renew their firing on the German troops. This made it necessary to set on fire a number of houses in order to drive out the marksmen from their places of concealment. A number of inhabitants were marched off as hostages to the monastery (Apps. 22-32). The 9th Company of the 178th Regiment occupied the garden of a villa along the Meuse and a factory which fronted the enemy on the left bank of the Meuse (Apps. 25, 30, 79). Here again they were fired on; the villa and the factory were therefore cleared of their occupants. The proprietor and a large number of the workpeople were fetched out of the cellar of the factory and shot, whilst the women and children found there were lodged in the monastery. Practically for the whole of the day the 178th Regiment carried on a hot fight with the population of Leffe, and suffered severe losses (Apps. 25, 26). Infantry Regiment No. 103, which reached Leffe towards evening, was also fired on by francs-tireurs from the slopes of the Leffe ravine as well as from the houses, and defended itself in the same way by disarming and shooting the men found with arms, and by burning down single houses which could not otherwise be cleared (Apps. 33, 36).