. . .To Staff-Captain Nuyten, assisted by Charles Louis Kogge, a "wateringue" guard of long experience and thoroughly acquainted with the working of the system of canals and locks, was entrusted the task of carrying out the plan.

The plain between Dixmude and Nieuport, being level with the sea, is protected at Nieuport against high water by a system of locks (sketch opposite). The canals and the Yser are dammed by embankments. The railway itself runs along a wide straight dike three to six feet in height.

Under bombardment, Belgian Engineers transformed this railway embankment into a water-tight dike, by stopping up all the openings through which the roads passed and then made wide breaches in the embankments of the drainage-canals, so as to allow the water to spread. The whole plain, between Nieuport and Dixmude was thus transformed into a vast basin closed on the Belgian side by the railway embankment, the latter being at the same time organized. . . Read More