A few days after the liberation of Belgium in the Tresignies Barracks of Charleroi on 7 October 1944, it was learned that all the men in the barracks were war volunteers. The enlistment had taken place in Mons on 23 September 1944 after the call of the Belgian government arrived from London. The 5th Belgian Fusiliers Battalion was the first unit of the Belgian Army formed on the national territory since 1940. The Tresignies Barracks had been occupied by the German Army from May 1940 until the liberation in the earliest days of September 1944. Most of the officers, NCOs and men were ex-Resistance fighters originating from the province of Hainaut. Some Belgian instructors landing in Normandy with the Allies completed the number of officers.
Rapid but intensive training was conducted in the Tresignies Barracks and on the fields around the coal mines around the town of Charleroi until 13 December 1944, date of the transfer of the battalion to the 1st US Army. On same day the battalion was sent to the Ardennes in Spa, Verviers, Malmédy, areas, which became the theatre of the Battle of the Bulge (North sector) three days later. From the 16 December 1944 the 5th Belgian Battalion of Fusiliers became mixed in the Allied operations against the Germans in the Battle of the Bulge.
The unit operated in the areas of Verviers, Remouchamps, Stavelot and Malmédy and was included in the patrols along the front line, protecting the American anti-tank posts rapidly deployed. While passing Malmédy (Baugnez) on 17 December, a few minutes before the 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion convoy, a platoon of the 5th Belgian Fusiliers escaped the massacre of the American convoy by Kampfgruppe Peiper. The Belgian platoon was in charge of the protection of the installation and convoys of the 200th US Quartermaster Company supplying gas for the tanks on the front line. The same platoon escaped again from the Germans around 0300 hours on 22 December in the forest east of Saint-Hubert, and a section of this platoon reached Bastogne with a small gasoline convoy for the 101st Airborne Division.
This section then succeeded in avoiding the German encircling through the road to Neufchâteau in the dark of the night. A Company of the 5th Belgian Fusiliers patrolling along the Vesdre railway captured German paratroops. Germans wearing American uniforms are also captured by the 5th Belgian Fusiliers between Remouchamps and Stoumont when the Kampfgruppe Peiper arrived in this area. On several occasions during the first days of the Battle of the Bulge the 5th Belgian Fusiliers operated on the first line before being relieved by American units. This happened namely between Stavelot and Malmédy during the evacuation of the gasoline dumps under enemy fire, also between Remouchamps and Stoumont when Peiper broke through, and in Cour and Andrimont where two sections of Fusiliers set up a defensive post when the enemy entered La Gleize. In Stavelot late in the morning of 18 December a platoon of 5th Fusiliers set fire to the first gasoline dumps along with soldiers of the 526th Armored Infantry Battalion and 825th Tank Destroyer Battalion on the old road to Francorchamps when Kampfgruppe Peiper penetrated Stavelot.
There are then lengthy periods of guard duty and patrols in the cold and snow; these are hard times for the unit unti1 25 January 1945. There will be dead, wounded and sick. After a short rest period and reorganization in the Verviers, Pepinste and Aubel areas, the 5th Belgian Battalion of Fusiliers penetrate into Germany in the first days of March 1945, cross the Rhine on a pontoon bridge at Königswinter between Bonn and Remagen at the end of March. The unit was in charge of protecting the communications lines of the 1st US Army in its rush to the East.
The Belgian Fusiliers are primarily used for security along a portion of the south flank of the Ruhr pocket where a German army is trapped. The 5th Fusiliers maintain their progression with the 1st US Army taking many German prisoners. When the war in Europe ended 8 May 1945, the Belgians were spread along the Fulda and Werra rivers southeast of Kassel where the Russians have arrived on the east bank of the Werra river. The 5th Belgian Battalion of Fusiliers returned to Belgium at the end of June 1945, and the unit demobilized on 30 November 1945. Most of the members return to civilian life.
