On 20th October the III Reserve Corps, the battering ram of the Fourth Army, began an attack with its 5th Reserve Division, supported by almost the whole of the Corps artillery, against the sector of the Yser west of the line MANNEKENSVERE-SCHOORBAKKE. The 4th _Ersatz_ Division to the north and the 6th Reserve Division to the south co-operated. By the early hours of the 22nd, the 5th and 6th Reserve Divisions had driven the enemy back across the river in spite of the support given him by British and French heavy batteries.[25] In front of the 4th _Ersatz_ Division the enemy still held a bridge-head at LOMBARTZYDE. At 8.15 A.M. on the 22nd the glad tidings reached the Staff of the 6th Reserve Division, that part of the 26th Reserve Infantry Regiment had crossed the YSER. Under cover of darkness the 1st and 2nd Battalions of this regiment had worked their way up to the north-eastern part of the bend of the YSER, south of SCHOORE, and had got into the enemy's outposts on the eastern bank with the bayonet. Not a shot had been fired, and not an unnecessary noise had disturbed the quiet of the dawning day. Volunteers from the engineers silently and rapidly laid bridging material over the canal. In addition an old footbridge west of KEYEM, which had been blown up and lay in the water, was very quickly made serviceable again with some planks and baulks. The Belgians had considered their position sufficiently protected by the river, and by the outposts along the eastern bank. By 6 A.M. German patrols were on the far side of the YSER, and the enemy's infantry and machine-gun fire began only when they started to make a further advance. Three companies of the 1st and two companies of the 2nd Battalion, however, as well as part of the 24th Reserve Infantry Regiment, had already crossed the temporary bridges at the double and taken up a position on the western bank: so that, in all, 2½ battalions and a machine-gun company were now on the western bank.