Study post-war program, Allies urged by Welles
Must start now or plans will be as numerous as governments, he warns
…
Red Cross to open fund drive Sunday
Washington (UP) –
President Roosevelt will inaugurate the 1943 war fund drive of the American Red Cross with a radio address over all major networks Sunday at 4:15 p.m. EWT.
Also participating will be Red Cross Chairman Norman Davis, from Washington; Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower from Allied General Headquarters in North Africa, and Adm. Chester Nimitz, Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet, from “a Pacific war theater.”
An address by Wendell Willkie before 20,000 persons at a Red Cross rally in St. Louis will be broadcast at 9:45 p.m. EWT, over the Blue Network.
Churches throughout the nation will join in observing “Red Cross Sunday.” Solicitors will work to collect a minimum of $125 million in March, which the President has proclaimed “Red Cross Month.”
Air crash victims sought at Lisbon
Lisbon, Portugal (UP) –
Authorities continued dragging the Tagus River today for the bodies of 18 passengers and crewmen still missing after the crash of the Pan American Airways’ Yankee Clipper Monday night.
The six bodies already recovered were burned in the British cemetery of the Clipper and more of the fuselage were raised from the river during the day.
Yanks on African boar hunt eat more than they catch
Watch native girls dance while dining on turkey, pigeon pie, almond paste and mint tea
…
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
The Tunisian front – (Feb. 25)
On the morning of the Germans’ surprise breakthrough out of Faid Pass, I was up in the Ousseltia Valley with another contingent of our troops.
Word came to us about noon that the Germans were advancing upon Sbeitla from Faid. So, I packed into my jeep and started alone on the familiar 85-mile drive south to Sbeitla. It was a bright day and everything seemed peaceful. I expected to see German planes as I neared Sbeitla, but there was none, and I drove into my cactus-patch destination about an hour before sundown.
I hadn’t been there 15 minutes when the dive bombers came, but that’s another story, which will come later.
I checked in at the intelligence tent to see what was going on, and found that things were dying down with the coming of dusk. So, I pitched my tent and went to bed right after supper.
Back to the cactus
Next morning, I got up before daylight and caught a ride, just after sunrise, with two officers going up to the new position of our forward command post. We drove very slowly, and all kept a keen eye on the sky. I didn’t have a gun, as correspondents are not supposed to carry arms. Occasionally we stopped the jeep and got far off the road behind some cactus hedges, but the German dive bombers were interested only in our troop concentrations far ahead.
Finally, we spotted a small cactus patch about half a mile off the road. We figured this was the new home of the forward command post, and it was. They had straggled in during the night and were still straggling in.
Along a one-way road
The cactus patch covered about two acres. In it were hidden half a dozen half-tracks, a couple of jeeps, three light tanks, and a couple of motorcycles – all that was left of the impressive array of the traveling headquarters that had fled Sidi Bouzid 18 hours before.
The commanding general had already gone forward again, in a tank, to participate in the day’s coming battle. The others of the command post were just sitting around on the ground. Half their comrades were missing. There was nothing left for them to work with, nothing to do.
When I came into this cactus patch the officers that I knew, and had left only four days before, jumped up and shook hands as though we hadn’t seen each other in years. Enlisted men did the same thing. I thought this was odd, at first, but now I know how they felt. They had been away – far along on the road that doesn’t come back – and now that they were still miraculously alive it was like returning from a voyage of many years, and naturally we shook hands.
A familiar pattern
During the next few hours there in the cactus patch I listened to dozens of personal escape stories. Every time I would get within earshot of another officer or enlisted man, he’d begin telling what had happened to him the day before. Talk about having to pull stories out of people – you couldn’t keep these guys from talking. There was something pathetic and terribly touching about it. Not one of them had ever thought he’d see the dawn, and now that he had seen it, his emotions had to pour out. And since I was the only newcomer to show up since their escape, I made a perfect sounding board.
The minute a man started talking he’d begin drawing lines on the ground with his shoe or a stick, to show the roads and how he came. I’ll bet I had that battleground scratched in the sand for me 50 times during the forenoon. It got so I could hardly keep from laughing at the consistency of their patterns.
Soothed by the sun
By all rights, that morning should have been a newspaperman’s dream. There were fantastic stories of escape, intimate recountings of fear and elation. Any one of them would have made a first-page feature story in any newspaper. Yet I was defeated by the flood of experiences. I listened until the stories finally became merged, overlapping and paralleling and contradicting, until the whole adventure became a composite, and today it is in my mind as in theirs a sort of generalized blur.
The sun came out warmly as though to soothe their jagged feelings, and one by one the men in the cactus patch stretched on the ground and fell wearily asleep at midday. And I, satiated with the adventures of the day, lay down and slept too, waiting for the new day’s battle to begin.
Millett: Soldier date is big break
Single civilians are scarce partners
By Ruth Millett
Hasn’t there been enough stuff and nonsense written about how fine and wonderful and patriotic it is for girls to spend their evenings dancing with soldiers at USO parties?
It sometimes sounds as though the girl who spends her evenings dancing with men in uniform is doing as much as they are to win the war.
Actually, the girls are having the tome of their lives. It is heaven for any girl to go to a dance where the men outnumber the women five to one.
And especially now, when there aren’t many single civilian men for a girl to date, it is pure luck to be able to meet a lot of soldiers.
So, the girls are having fun. There is nothing wrong with that, of course. It’s nice that there are some gay evenings for them, with plenty of men around to make them feel glamorous.
But why try to make heroines of them? Why build up dancing with men to the point where it seems as though if she goes to a couple of USO dances each week, a girl is doing her part to help win the war?
The buildup is silly. And it certainly isn’t necessary, because girls don’t have to be sold on entertaining soldiers.
Uniforms sell themselves. These girls, who are fortunate enough to go to dances when there are plenty of handsome men in uniform, have been described as “unselfish, patriotic, and deserving of high praise.”
Forget it. The truth is they’re just plain lucky, as any lonely girl who doesn’t live near an Army camp will tell you.
House to vote soon on salary ceiling
Washington (UP) –
Congressional leaders today forecast early approval by the House of legislation to repeal the President’s $25,000 net salary limitation order and replace it with statutory provision permitting salaries above $25,000 net to remain at Pearl Harbor.
Early consideration of the proposal, sponsored by Wesley E. Disney (D-OK), is assured by the administration’s desire to obtain passage of the bill raising the national debt limit from $125 billion to $210 billion before April 1. The Disney plan is an amendment to that bill.
Mr. Disney submitted the Ways and Means Committee’s report on the legislation to the House yesterday. It said the President had no authority to order a $25,000 net ceiling on salaries.
Missing plane found by Army; 2 of crew dead
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (UP) –
U.S. Army officers have announced here that one of two transport planes which vanished on Feb. 6 had been located by a searching aircraft.
Of the four men aboard, the U.S. Army reported that the pilot and co-pilot had been killed in the crash. The two passengers were injured but managed to escape from the wreckage.
Closeup of a muddle –
Divided authority on U.S. oil called intolerable mess
Senate committee’s investigation shows transportation problems affected by nine different agencies
By E. A. Evans, Scripps-Howard staff writer
…
Völkischer Beobachter (February 27, 1943)
Drei Sondermeldungen in vier Tagen –
Dreißig Schiffe aus einem Geleitzug torpediert
Sechs Tage lang und über 2500 Kilometer ging die Verfolgungsschlacht
Berlin, 26. Februar –
Die dritte Sondermeldung in vier Tagen über die Erfolge deutscher Unterseeboote, die am Freitagabend über den Großdeutschen Rundfunk ging und die Versenkung von neuerlich 17 Schiffen mit insgesamt 107.800 BRT. meldete, brachte die seit Wochenbeginn mitgeteilten Versenkungsergebnisse der Unterseeboote auf 49 Frachter und Tanker sowie 4 Transportsegler mit zusammen 315.000 BRT. Dazu kommen 3 Kriegsfahrzeuge des Geleitdienstes. Der Aderlaß für die englische und die USA.-Handelsflotte ist aber noch größer, da von den 9 als schwer beschädigt gemeldeten wetteren Dampfern nur wenige einen Hafen erreicht haben werden. Besonders bemerkenswert aber ist die Mitteilung aus der Befehlsstelle des Großadmirals Dönitz, daß dabei allein aus einem einzigen Geleitzug, der von England nach Nordamerika strebte, 23 Frachter und Tanker versenkt und 7 weitere beschädigt worden sind, wodurch das Großgeleit bis auf kleine Überbleibsel vernichtet werden konnte. Dies ist die sechstägige Geleitzugschlacht, die in der Sondermeldung erwähnt ist und in ihrer Härte und ihrem Ausmaß zu den besonders hervorragenden Leistungen der Unterseebootwaffe der deutschen Kriegsmarine in ihrer an Erfolgen so reichen ozeanischen Seekriegführung gehört.
Über eine Strecke von 2500 Kilometer Länge (etwa Paris bis Moskau), von der ersten Sichtmeldung 600 Seemeilen südwestlich Irlands bis an die neblige Neufundlandbank, hat diese Geleitzugschlacht von den Mittagsstunden des 20. Februar bis in die Morgenstunden des 25. Februar Tag und Nacht getobt. Sie wurde geschlagen, nachdem sich die Stürme der ersten Februarwochen zeitweise gelegt hatten. In der Sturmperiode hatten unsere Unterseeboote nicht geruht, sondern sich trotz des schlechten Wetters zu einem neuen Schlag bereit gemacht, bei dem sich ihre gefürchtete Rudeltaktik aufs neue bewährt hat. Am 21. Februar erfolgte aus dem westwärts steuernden Geleit die erste Versenkung des abgesprengten Tankers „Stigstad.“ Am 22. Februar wurden aus dem stark gesicherten und abwehrbereiten Geleit die ersten drei Tanker torpediert und dann folgten, während noch mehr Unterseeboote auf den feindlichen Schiffsverband angesetzt wurden, Schlag auf Schlag die weiteren Versenkungen. Obwohl der Wind zeitweise wieder bis zur Stärke 7 auffrischte und mehrfach schlechte Sicht und Nebel die Angriffe behinderten, wurden insgesamt 30 Schiffe torpediert, so daß nur ein geringer Rest noch die Gewässer von Neufundland erreichte. Dieser Vernichtungssieg über ein englisch-amerikanisches Großgeleit ist errungen worden, obwohl die feindliche Gegenwehr sehr heftig war, obwohl der Geleitzug weit ausholende Ausweichbewegungen machte und sich zeitweise in mehrere kleinere Gruppen aufteilte. Die Zusammenfassung des feindlichen Schiffsverkehrs in Geleitzüge bietet den deutschen Unterseebooten Massenziele.
Erfolge gegen starke Abwehrerzielt
Aber die Erfolge fallen ihnen deshalb nicht etwa in den Schoß. In der englischen und USA.-Presse möchte man es freilich so darstellen, als ob die Erfolge der deutschen Unterseeboote nur einem Mangel an Geleitkriegsschiffen zuzuschreiben sind. Die USA.-Zeitschrift Times hat diese Agitation zur Begründung der schweren Schiffsverluste soweit übertrieben, daß sie schrieb, große Geleitzüge würden oft nur von einem einzigen Zerstörer begleitet, der nicht überall zugleich sein könnte. So einfach haben es die deutschen Unterseeboote in Wirklichkeit durchaus nicht, sondern die Versenkungen feindlicher Frachter und Tanker erfolgen in zähestem Ringen gegen die starke Sicherung der feindlichen Geleitzüge. Zu dieser Sicherung gehören außer Zerstörern, Korvetten und ähnlichen Geleitzugfahrzeugen auch zahlreiche feindliche Flugzeuge. Die Engländer und Amerikaner sind bestrebt, jedem Geleitzug auf einzelnen Dampfern oder auf Hilfsflugzeugträgern Bordflugzeuge zu seiner Sicherung mitzugeben. Dazu kommen die Flugboote, zum Beispiel vom Typ „Catalina,“ und die viermotorigen Fernbomber vom Typ „Liberator,“ die dadurch einer Verwendung gegen Landziele entzogen werden. Gegen ein derartiges Aufgebot von See- und Luftstreitkräften also müssen sich die deutschen Unterseeboote durchsetzen. Ihre Siege in den Geleitzugschlachten werden dadurch nur um so wertvoller und bedeutsamer. Sie zeugen von dem unbeugsamen Angriffswillen und dem taktischen Geschick der Unterseebootkommandanten und von der Zähigkeit ihrer Besatzungen, aber auch von der Güte der Boote, Motoren und Waffen aus deutschen Werften und Rüstungswerken, die sich im Gefecht, im Wasserbombenhagel und in schwerer See ständig zu erproben haben.
Außer in der Geleitzugschlacht im Nordatlantik sind auch weiter südlich im Atlantik und im Mittelmeer neue Erfolge gegen feindliche Geleitzüge, insbesondere des Nachschubs für Nordafrika, erzielt worden, der durch die Ereignisse in Tunis für unsere Gegner besonders dringlich geworden ist. Ferner werden Versenkungen aus dem Seeraum von Südafrika gemeldet, wo sich ebenfalls die feindliche Abwehr verstärkt hat. Aus Kapstadt wurde dieser Tage in einer Reuter-Meldung berichtet, daß zahlreiche Sicherungsfahrzauge in südafrikanischen Gewässern neu eingesetzt worden seien. Dies kennzeichnet die Zwangslage, in die die feindliche Seekriegführung durch die weiträumigen deutschen Unterseebootoperationen versetzt worden ist. Selbst in den entferntesten Seegebieten müssen die englische und die USA.-Kriegsmarine Abwehrkräfte bereitstellen. Das Geleitzugsystem ist längst südlich über den Äquator hinaus ausgedehnt worden, was auch dort eine Verlangsamung und Behinderung des Seeverkehrs bedeutet. Trotz dieser gesteigerten Abwehr und trotz der großen Materialaufwendungen des Gegners aber können die Erfolge der deutschen Unterseeboote nicht aufgehalten werden.
EG
Warum schweigt die USA.-Gesandtschaft?
Der „Clipper“-Absturz in Lissabon
vb. Lissabon, 26. Februar –
Die Lissaboner Hafenbehörden sind noch immer eifrig bemüht, die Leichen der Insassen des „Clipper“-Flugbootes, das – wie gemeldet – am Montagnachmittag im Lissaboner Hafen abstürzte, aufzufinden. Die Flugzeugteile selbst sind inzwischen bis auf einen Motor gehoben worden. Nach mehrtägigem hartnäckigem Schweigen hat sich die USA.-Gesandtschaft nunmehr bereit gefunden, wenigstens einige Namen der geretteten Personen bekanntzugeben, darunter die der Besatzungsmitglieder.
Der Kommandant des Flugzeuges, Kapitän Sullivan, befindet sich unter den Verletzten. Unverletzt blieben eine amerikanische Rundfunksängerin und ein amerikanischer Legationssekretär namens Butterworth. über die Namen der ums Leben gekommenen Passagiere schweigt sich die USA.-Gesandtschaft immer noch aus.
U.S. Navy Department (February 27, 1943)
Communiqué No. 293
North Pacific.
On February 25, U.S. bombers, with fighter escort, attacked Japanese positions at Kiska.
South Pacific.
On February 26, Dauntless dive bombers (Douglas), with Wildcat (Grumman F4F) escort, attacked Japanese positions at Munda. Many fires were started and at least one plane was destroyed on the ground.
The Pittsburgh Press (February 27, 1943)
500 BRITISH PLANES BOMBARD COLOGNE WITH BLOCKBUSTERS
Smash by RAF follows U.S. daylight raid
Attacks called taste of non-stop pounding of Germany
By Sidney J. Williams, United Press staff writer
Air blitz comes home to roost, with day and night bombing of Germany. The current series of non-stop U.S. and British raids started Thursday night with a one-hour RAF attack on Nürnberg. Precision bombers of the U.S. Air Force followed this with a daylight attack on Wilhelmshaven yesterday, and last night, the RAF thundered over Cologne with 500 planes to plaster that often-bombed city. Other attacks were made on Nazi bases at Dunkirk, Cherbourg and Rennes in France.
London, England –
British four-engined bombers last night rocked Cologne, the huge German industrial center, in a blockbuster assault second in scale only to last summer’s 1,000-plane raid.
Officially described as “very heavy,” the raid carried the most concentrated Anglo-American aerial offensive of the war past the 24-hour mark.
Only 10 bombers were lost, considered a remarkably small payment for such a heavy attack.
3 Canadian planes lost
Three of the missing bombers were from the Royal Canadian Air Force, a Canadian communiqué reported.
The announcement that the raid was the second heaviest of the war on Cologne indicated that at least 500 planes participated.
An Air Ministry communiqué said “good results” were observed.
British bombers also attacked objectives in western Germany during the night while fighters and fighter-bombers attacked railway targets in northern France, the communiqué said.
But the main weight of bombs was concentrated on Cologne.
Two- and four-ton blockbusters and thousands of incendiaries were unloaded on the key German industrial city, site of numerous factories turning out parts for U-boats.
The weather over the city was clear apart from ground haze and pilots reported only moderate anti-aircraft fire despite the importance of their targets.
Aim at diesel works
The heaviest weight of bombs was reported concentrated on the Diesel engine works and munitions factories.
The giant four-engined Lancaster, Stirling and Halifax bombers struck in the wake of U.S. Flying Fortresses that pounded the Wilhelmshaven naval base in daylight yesterday and other long-range RAF bombers that swept deep into Germany Thursday night to blast the industrial center of Nürnberg.
Thus, Germany was now getting a real foretaste of what it may expect when the all-out Allied aerial attack rises to a full crescendo in the coming months to pave the way for the impending invasion of Europe.
Much of city in ruins
Much of Cologne was already in ruins as result of the 1,000-plane raid last May 30 and subsequent lighter assaults. The Air Ministry announced early this month that 600 acres of Cologne were devastated and 250 factories wrecked or damaged in that one night of May 30, when 3,000 tons of bombs were dropped.
Last night’s raid interrupted frantic German efforts to restore the city to its former productive capacity. Cologne, in the heart of the Rhineland, is Germany’s third city and British authorities said the Germans appeared to have given first priority to repair work there.
Despite wholesale evacuation of Cologne, there probably still are 500,000 persons in the city, it was said.
Bombed 113 times
Cologne has now been bombed 113 times, making it the most bombed city in Germany. The last previous RAF raid was on the night of Feb. 14.
The Anglo-American offensive was now on an around-the-clock basis.
Strong formations of planes flew across the English Channel toward Calais this afternoon and the sound of explosions could be heard in coastal towns. Later, the planes were heard returning.
Interspersed between the main attacks on Germany were subsidiary raids on the docks at Dunkirk, airfields at Cherbourg, railroad yards and the naval storage depot at Rennes and coastal shipping by light bombers and fighters that shuttled back and forth to occupied France yesterday.
Blow at submarines
The targets made it plain that the Allies had thrown the full strength of their air arm behind the initial objective in their offensive plans for 1943 – dealing smashing blows to Germany’s submarine strength in order to clear the ocean lanes for supplies, men and munitions necessary for the final attack on Hitler’s stronghold.
Wilhelmshaven is a big submarine station, repair depot and training station. Nürnberg is the center of some of the largest factories turning our Diesel engines and other equipment and devices for U-boats.
The German supply depot at Rennes was the distribution point for nearly every article needed to supply U-boats.
The airdromes in the Cherbourg area of northern France are bases for the Nazi fighters which guard the French coast. Dunkirk, which was raided three times yesterday, is one of the submarine and E-boat bases on the French coast.
The attacks were on a nearly continuous scale and it was indicated that they will continue at a steadily rising tempo in the coming weeks unless bad weather interferes.
Simultaneously, the German Air force is being badly stretched to protect vital European targets and at the same time maintain active fighting strength on the fighting fronts in Russia and Tunisia.
The repeated air blows against Western Europe are believed to have forced the Germans to call back their best fighter pilots from the Russian and Tunisian fronts in a desperate effort to parry the offensive.
This comment from a member of a Flying Fortress crew that participated in yesterday’s raid on Wilhelmshaven was a tipoff:
We were up against the scrub teams before; now they’re sending in the first stringers.
The offensive is not being carried on without losses. Seven Flying Fortresses were lost in yesterday’s Wilhelmshaven attack and nine British bombers in the Nürnberg raid.
However, it is customarily estimated that bomber losses of less than 10% are not an excessive price and the Anglo-American losses are probably substantially below that figure.
German planes, meanwhile, continued their feeble raid against Britain.
Bombs were dropped in East Anglia last night, but only slight damage and no serious casualties were reported. Two enemy planes were shot down near the southeast coast.
‘It was hell 26,000 feet above earth,’ reporter says
Enemy fighters swarm over Fortresses at Wilhelmshaven
By Walter Cronkite, United Press staff writer
U.S. Flying Fortress base, somewhere in England –
It was hell 26,000 feet above the earth, a hell of burning tracer bullets and bursting flak, of crippled Flying Fortresses and flaming German fighter planes.
I rode a Flying Fortress into the midst of it with the U.S. 8th Air Force on their raid on the Wilhelmshaven naval base in northwest Germany yesterday.
For two hours, I sat through a vicious battle with twisting and turning Focke-Wulf 190 fighters and held tight while we dodged savage anti-aircraft fire. My reward was to see American bombs falling toward German soil.
Luck was with us and our Fortress came through the torrent without damage. Other formations caught the brunt of the fighter blows and we saw Fortresses and Liberators plucked from the flights around us. Altogether, seven planes are missing.
We knocked out our share of fighters, and as we swept back over the North Sea we saw great pillars of smoke pluming from the target area.
It was the first time correspondents had been permitted to accompany the Flying Fortresses or Liberators on raids over Germany or France. Eight reporters had qualified to go, but one was ill and another was aboard a ship which turned back.
We were skirting the Frisian Islands and still an hour from the target when our tail gunner, Sgt. George W. Henderson, 22, of Columbus, Kansas, sighted the first of the enemy fighters.
It didn’t take the fighters long to close in on us. Meanwhile, I was trying to escape the front from the windows in the plastic nose of the plane in order to see.
The fighter came toward us with guns spitting. We couldn’t hear them because of the noise of our own engines.
Our tail gunner was the first to open up. We could feel the vibrations set up by his rattling gun. Then the waist gunners, Sgt. Edward Z. Harmon, 33, of Talue Lake, California, and Sgt. Duward L. Hinds, 33, of Los Angeles, took over.
Heck Balk, 22, of Temple, Texas, veteran of 10 missions, was banging away from the ball turret on the belly of the plane.
A spurt of flames immediately overhead disclosed that Sgt. Charles E. Zipfel, 22, of Sigel, Pennsylvania, had joined in from the top turret.
Then the enemy planes swept by and the bombardier and navigator in the nose began firing. Clips of empty cartridges flew around the tiny compartment and the stench of burning powder filtered through our oxygen masks.
The bombardier, 1st Lt. Albert W. Dieffenbach, 26, of Washington, turned around and lifted his thumb. That meant that our tracers had at least scared off the attacking enemy.
The anti-aircraft fire began as we started the bombing run into Wilhelmshaven and didn’t end until we had passed the last tiny peninsula of the continent.
The first flak broke some distance below and to the left of us. There were tiny burst of flame and small puffs of black smoke that gradually grew larger as the wind dispersed them. It surprised me not to be able to hear the burst.
Then bursts appeared in front of us; then top the right and not nearly so far away.
One gunner said:
It looks like they are laying out a carpet of that stuff for us.
I watched, fascinated, as the big Fortresses above and below took evasive turns and narrowly avoided flak, forgetting that some of the bursting shrapnel might pierce the nose of our own plane.
The crew told me that there was not much danger that flak would knock down a ship by itself, but once a ship has been damaged and is forced to drop out of formation, the enemy fighters gang up on it and hit it like kids on a merry-go-round, plucking for the brass ring.
I saw one bomber several thousand feet below, under control but obviously damaged by anti-aircraft fire. Seven enemy fighters circled it, giving it burst after burst.
We had our share of enemy fighters. About 20 were almost constantly within attack range throughout the two-hour fight. With scarcely a pause, someone on the ship was calling out over the intercommunication phone the codenames for the position of an approaching enemy.
“Six o’clock low.”… “Four o’clock high.”… “Two o’clock high.”
“Get on him!… Give him a burst… Keep him out there.”
As our guns shook, the plane, the voice of the skipper, Capt. Glenn E. Hagenbuck, 24, of Utica, Illinois, rang out:
That’s scaring him off, boys. He won’t be back for a while.
Your first impression of an oncoming enemy fighter is similar to your first impression of flak – nothing much to frighten you. You can’t see his guns firing and you seldom see his bullets spurt by. You just know he’s firing on you.
Once I saw a body plummet by. The parachute finally blossomed out below. Later, I saw a Nazi pilot bail out and his Focke Wulf spiral down toward the sea.
We saw Wilhelmshaven through broken clouds. It looked like a toy village from 26,000 feet.
The planes ahead were the first to drop their bombs. The “eggs” were plenty hideous looking as they began what appeared a slow descent to earth.
Then Lt. Dieffenbach’s left hand went out to the switch panel alongside him and almost imperceptibly he touched the button.
“Bomb away!” her said calmly over the intercommunication system.
It was a letdown. I couldn’t see our own bombs falling and even our ball turret gunner was unable to see them hit the ground because of our extreme height.
I did see some bombs hurtling down, however. From almost immediately above us from another formation. They came so close to our wings that I almost could read the inscriptions on them. The crew members bluntly expressed their opinions over the intercommunication phone.
The trip back home was almost an anti-climax.
Other members of the crew of the Fortress in which I flew were 1st Lt. Walter M. Soha, 26, of Crystal Falls, Michigan (navigator); 2nd Lt. John C. Barker, 23, of Duluth, Minnesota (co-pilot), and Sgt. Clarence S. Comes, 24, of Sacramento, California (radioman).
Fortress reporter for Times missing
London, England (UP) –
Robert Post, correspondent of The New York Times, is missing from yesterday’s American air raid on Wilhelmshaven, Germany, Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews announced today.
Gen. Andrews said that two men were reported to have parachuted from the disabled four-motored bomber in which Mr. Post was riding which gave rise to the possibility that he is now a prisoner of war.
Mr. Post was one of six American reporters who accompanied the raiders. He was the only one who didn’t return.
Fleeing Nazis try jabs at Allied lines
Thrusts repulsed in northern Tunisia sector; Rommel retreat continues
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer
…
Radio singer to inspect $350,000 worth of loot
Hollywood, California (UP) –
Dinah Shore, radio singer, headed a list of filmland burglary victims summoned to inspect $350,000 worth of loot recovered after the capture of two suspects today.
In jail was James A. Gould, 43, arrested on a tip from the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Officers said victims of more than 50 robberies in Hollywood, Beverly Hills and Los Angeles would be asked to examine the jewelry and furs seized in the arrest.