halt by fierce resistance near St. Hubert, and was soon drawn into heavy fighting south of Bastogne. On the 21st, Manteuffel pulled Panzer Lehr out of the fight for Bastogne and grouped it with the 2nd Panzer Division and 116th Panzer Division Windhund for an assault on Dinant and the Meuse. Assault on Dinant After a day spent on reorganising the attack, Panzer Lehr finally got underway. It fought its way through St. Hubert and the road to Dinant and the Meuse again seemed open. The assaulting unit, the 902nd Panzergrenadier Regiment, was met by heavy resistance. Nor was the advance to become any easier thereafter. On 23 December, the division fought all day to reduce the town of Rochefort, suffering heavy casualties. The Americans finally withdrew – their casualties 25 men killed and 15 men wounded, after holding off an elite panzer division for an entire day. Bayerlein later compared the defence of Rochefort to that of Bastogne. Panzer Lehr made two rescue attempts to save 2nd Panzer and succeeded in retaking Humain, but unable to go any further. After another failed rescue effort by 9th Panzer, Panzer Lehr was ordered to fall back. Of the 2nd Panzer Kampfgruppe, only Major Cochenhausen and 600 or so of his men managed to escape on foot, abandoning almost all of the division's armor to the advancing Allies. The Meuse would not be reached; Wacht Am Rhein had failed. Relief of Bastogne The remnants of Manteuffel's strike force were pulled back for one final attempt to take Bastogne. Panzer Lehr began to move into its new positions, after US 4th Armored Division, the spearhead of George Patton's US Third Army, began its attack to relieve Bastogne and a corridor to the surrounded 101st Airborne was created. Panzer Lehr was then involved in the unsuccessful operations to close the corridor, and finally the exhausted division was pulled out of the battle. Panzer Lehr had once again been virtually annihilated. The Netherlands to Ruhr Pocket After the failure of the Ardennes offensive, Panzer Lehr was refitted once again, though not to anywhere near the lavish standard of its earlier incarnations. Many of the veterans were dead, and the Panzer Lehr of early 1945 bore little resemblance to that of June 1944. The division was moved north, into the Rhineland, where it was engaged fighting Bernard Montgomery's Anglo-Canadian 21st Army Group again during Operation Veritable,