DIXMUDE, dilcsimood-e, (Flemish Diks muiden), a town of Belgium on the Yser Canal, about 15 miles southwest of Ostend and 10 miles from the coast, with a population in 1914 of 4,000. A quaint, old-fashioned place, all bricks and tiles, dotted with cafes and nunneries, Dix mude is the centre of an essentially agricultural district. Surrounded by flat meadows and beet root fields, intersected by canals and marshes, the district has been reconquered from the sea by centuries of effort. The sea is kept under control by a formidable array of sluices, locks, chambers, water-gates and cranks at Nieuport, eight miles away. In the European War Dix mude witnessed stirring scenes during October 1914. After the fall of Antwerp on the 9th a brigade of French marines, numbering 6,000 and commanded by Rear-Admiral Ronarc'h, was thrown into the town to assist the retreating Belgians in holding the Yser line against the German rush to the sea. Outnumbered by six to one the marines held Dixmude for nearly four weeks, fighting desperately in rags under incessant rain, barring the road to Dunkirk, en suring the safety of the Belgian army and en abling the French armies of the North to con centrate behind the Yser. All the civil popula
tion had left the town. On 25 October the Belgian General Headquarters Staff at the sug gestion, it is said, of M. Charles Kogge, garde wateringue of the north of Furnes, decided to call the waters to their aid. The sluices and water-gates at Nieuport were opened, the sea entered and forced back the fresh waters of the canal and its tributaries. By slow degrees the water rose in a few days and converted a zone of about 25 square miles into one vast lagoon. Flat-bottomed British monitors, assisted by French and British warships off the coast, fought off the German attempt on Nieuport for 10 days and saved it. The German forces and guns floundered in water and mud, hundreds were drowned and the main struggle for the shortest route to Calais came to an end. The French marines held their position. The loss of Dixmude bsfore 1 November would have been disastrous to the Belgian right. As many as 15 attacks were repelled in one night. On 10 Nov. 1914 Dixmude fell after a heavy bombardment. Consult Le Goffic, C., (London 1916). See WAR, OF