The long list of German atrocities against civilians, and their total razing of the city of Leuven beginning August 25, soon came to be known as the “Rape of Belgium”. It’s difficult to know how much of what we know was exaggerated for propagandistic purposes—not least to try to bring the USA into the war on the Allies’ side. But between fanciful stories of German soldiers bayonetting (and even eating) babies and verified accounts of mass public executions, even for a time of war the German campaign in Belgium was gratuitously violent.
The German chief of general staff himself, Helmuth von Moltke, conceded that, “our advance into Belgium is certainly brutal, but we are fighting for our lives and all who get in our way must face the consequences.” But although Belgian men, women, and children would ultimately count among the victims of German atrocities, it doesn’t appear that all who got in the way were destined to face the consequences. Reports on both sides recalled that either out of respect for his status or through fear for killing a relative of the German Kaiser, no German troops fired on Albert.
We’ll never know whether or not this was just rumour. We do know, however, that Albert never shied away from grave danger. He personally led the Belgian defence at the Siege of Antwerp: one of the most decisive battles of the war’s early stage. The city was well defended by a series of forts and other defensive positions, and while Belgian forces could never hope to hold off any invaders completely, they could at least expect with some determined resistance to hold off an attacking army until her European protectors came to her relief.
After nearly two weeks of fighting, staggering losses, and some heroic sorties launched by the outnumbered and outgunned Belgians, Antwerp eventually fell to the Germans in October. Albert retreated his forces to Yser on the North Sea coast, drawing up a last line of defence along the Yser canal. He might have been propped up by French divisions and the British Expeditionary Force, but Albert was fighting a losing battle. And eventually, after suffering 3,500 deaths and 15,000 wounded, the Belgian king resorted to drastic measures to stem the German tide.
Opening the canal’s locks and flooding the surrounding the Low Countries, he forced the German Fourth Army to retreat to nearby Ypres (more or less the area where they dug in for the next four years). The Belgians couldn’t exactly claim a victory, but in failing to capture Paris and bring the war to a speedy conclusion the Germans had unquestionably suffered a defeat. What’s more, for good or for bad, Albert’s decision effectively ended the Race to the Sea and ensured the beginning of trench warfare on the Western Front.