The Retreat
At 5pm the General Staff takes the decision to retreat the Royal Naval Division, together with the 2nd Army Division. At 5.30pm the orders are sent to the 1st and 2nd Naval Brigade and the Marine Brigade. Through a misinterpretation of the orders most of the 1st Naval Brigade receives the orders only around 9pm.
At 7pm, the Portsmouth Battalion receives the order to serve as a rear-guard for the 1st Naval Brigade, Plymouth Battalion will perform the same task for the 2nd Naval Brigade. At 6.45pm Howe Battalion is ordered to withdraw. Howe and Hood Battalions reach Wilrijk Station at 7pm, retreat with the 2nd Naval Brigade and cross the southern boat-bridge at 8.30pm. The march continues to Zwijndrecht where they arrive around 10.15pm. The Brigade continues to SintNiklaas, which it reaches around 11pm. Around 3.30am on October 9, 1914 the brigade is ordered to move on to Sint-Gillis Waas. The unit succeeds to embark on a train around 7am, arriving in Bruges in the morning. After a day’s rest, the brigade departs for Ostend via Blankenberge. The brigade leaves Ostend on October 11, 1914 at 2am with the SS Edystone, sailing to Dover. The units arrive over the course of the day.
Royal Marines during the retreat from Antwerp
Commander Henderson of the 1st Naval Brigade gets the order to withdraw only around 9pm. Lieutenant Grant, commander of the troops of the Benbow Battalion manning Fort4, only receives the order to retreat around midnight. 1st Naval Brigade has to pull out via the Mechelsepoort through the center of Antwerp and use the Northern boat-bridge. However, the units get lost in
the bombed out streets and on their arrival at the quay at the Steen Castle, the bridge is already blown. The brigade marches further in a southerly direction along the docks and boats and reach the southern bridge . During the morning several battalions are able to cross the Scheldt there. They pull back on the left bank and reach Zwijndrecht at 4.30am on October 9, 1914. They move on and reach Sint-Gillis-Waas in the course of the day. There they are told that the Germans have cut off the corridor of the Waasland. The units withdraw northward toward De Klinge . They arrive there at 6.30pm. The officers discuss the situation and the possibilities to cross the Dutch border throughout the night. Many have the wrong idea that, as in the maritime law, they have 24h to leave Dutch territory. The Dutch border is crossed in the early morning of October 10, 1914. There the 1442 sailors and 37 officers of the Hawke , Benbow and Collingwood Battalions are disarmed immediately. They will spend the rest of the war in an internment camp in Groningen.
The Portsmouth Battalion, acting as a rear guard, takes a different route, arriving in Sint-Niklaas on October 9, 1914 around 5pm. They are informed by the locals that there are no more trains westward. They move on to Kemzeke. Along the way they rally some 600 members of the 1st Naval Brigade. They leave at 8pm on a train. Half an hour later, the train is ambushed at Moerbeke. The Marines dislodge the Germans, but can’t avoid that most of the overtired ratings and some of the Marines surrender. They proceed further on foot and reach Zelzate in the early morning of October 10, 1914. From there, they move by train to Ostend. Later in the morning another train from Antwerp arrives in Ostend with some 200 ratings on board.
After the surrender of the large group of ratings in Moerbeke, the Germans march them to the south. In an escape attempt six sailors and Marines are shot. Lieutenant Commander Oswald Hanson of the Benbow Battalion tries to prevent the firing on his men and hits a German soldier in the process. He is tried by a German court martial and is executed in the afternoon of October 10, 1914. He is now buried in Dendermonde. |
Newspaper clipping about the death of Hanson
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