GOP to petition for House rule on pay-go tax
Effort made to force committee Democrats to free bill
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Blood spilled in Tunisia turns Yanks into killers
Americans lose their early bravado in battle, become crafty, hating fighting men
By Phil Ault, United Press staff writer
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Gen. Patton praises troops for victory at El Guettar
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Allies nearing first goal on path to Berlin
Bigger air raids ushering in second phase – invasion
By Harrison Salisbury, United Press staff writer
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Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
In Tunisia –
The central part of Tunisia is a sandy-colored, desert-like country. It is made up of mountain ridges with wide, flat, fertile valleys between them. The ridges have fir trees high up, but the valleys are without vegetation except for the crops and a knee-high growth of bush. Consequently, the valleys are poor places for hiding big motorized troop concentrations. About the only thing that affords any natural cover is an olive grove or a cactus patch.
Some of these cactus patches grow wild, and others are planted in rows just like any other crop. The plants are shoulder-high, and have big thick leaves of the prickly-pear type. They have thorns an inch long, vicious and cruel. The cactus is grown for camel feed, and camels actually come up and eat them off the bush. How they do it I don’t know, for the stickers are as hard as steel needles, and they don’t bend. But the camels don’t seem to mind.
Danger in cactus patch
Every soldier over here has learned to tread cautiously through a cactus patch, for these stickers can cause you grave trouble. They frequently start bad infections. I saw a soldier one day being taken to the rear with his arm swollen so badly he had to carry it on a sort of rack. And I myself had a small experience with them. I’d noticed for several days that my right knee was so sore I could hardly put any weight on it when I got down to roll up my bedroll. But I supposed I’d just bruised it on a rock, and didn’t pay much attention.
It wasn’t until I returned to the city and took off my clothes for the first time in weeks that I saw an angry-looking lump on my knee. So, like a country boy, I squeezed it and out popped a cactus thorn half an inch long.
In a day or two the soreness was gone. Anybody else would probably have lost his leg, but you see I lead such a pure life that my blood was clear and strong and noble and all that stuff, period.
Goes to battle with shovel
The soldiers all laughed when I started out to battle armed only with a shovel. That does seem a ridiculous instrument to carry to the wars, but I’m a pretty smart guy, you know, and I’d figured the thing all out ahead of time. My calculations were verified when I got up front where the boys actually know what the zing of a bullet sounds like. None of them laughed. Because, brother, when you’re up there where the dive bombers play, digging becomes instinctive.
I’ve heard of dive-bombings so severe that soldiers lying in shallow trenches would try to dig deeper with their fingernails. And I know of many a man who is alive today because he happened to be near an empty foxhole some previous warrior had dug. Long live the shovel!
There seems to be a sort of unwritten law that full colonels and generals always act nonchalant when in danger. Most colonels and generals don’t wear their steel helmets in battle. I thought for a while it was an unbreakable tradition, but I have seen a few colonels and generals wearing them.
I lost my steel helmet
I don’t wear mine, incidentally. But that’s not because I’m nonchalant. It’s because I got rattled and forgot and left it lying under as truck one night when we were retreating.
When you drive over a Tunisian road the morning after a big night convoy has passed, you see occasional trucks and tanks that have run off the road in the blackout.
I remember one morning counting two trucks and three tanks hanging over the edge in a distance of 45 miles. Nothing seemed to be damaged, and wreckers would soon have them out. One tank had run off a concrete bridge and dropped about 10 feet into the dry steam-bed below.
It was just after daylight, and we stopped to see if anybody were hurt. Everything was still and quiet around the tank. And then we saw, about 50 feet away, the whole crew stretched out on the sand, covered with their blankets, sound asleep while the morning sun beamed down on them. As peaceful a picture as you ever saw.
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U.S. Navy Department (April 15, 1943)
Communiqué No. 344
North Pacific.
On April 13, during the day, ten attacks were carried out against Japanese installations at Kiska by formations of Army Liberator (Consolidated B‑24) heavy bombers, Mitchell (North American B‑25) light bombers and Warhawk (Curtiss P‑40) and Lightning (Lockheed P‑38) fighters. Beached enemy float planes were strafed. Many hits were scored and fires were started in the runway and main camp area.
South Pacific.
On April 14, during the afternoon, Avenger (Grumman TBF) torpedo bombers and Wildcat (Grumman F4F) fighters bombed and strafed Japanese barges and installations in Viru Harbor, New Georgia Island. Several fires were started.
News Release
For Immediate Release
April 15, 1943
Army bomber sinks submarine in Caribbean
A heavy bomber of the U.S. Army Air Forces caught a German submarine cruising on the surface in the Caribbean Sea several months ago, and destroyed the undersea raider with depth charges. A member of the submarine’s crew, who survived the attack, later was picked up by a U.S. destroyer.
The plane, piloted by CPT Howard Burhanna Jr., USAAF, of 1747 Maryland St., Philadelphia, was on a patrol flight when the submarine was sighted on the surface, eight miles away. Changing his course CPT Burhanna made for the sub, and in a few minutes was over his target. The sub had not had time to submerge, and was still on the surface when the plane released its depth charges.
Immediately after the attack, air and oil bubbles began rising from the water with gradually increasing intensity. Thirty‑seven minutes later, the men in the bomber spotted a large volume of oil and air bubbles surging to the surface. The oil slick spread out in a large circular area.
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The Pittsburgh Press (April 15, 1943)
BRITISH 35 MILES FROM TUNIS
Allies seize two heights in Axis lines
Gen. Montgomery masses 8th Army for new assault
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer
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Yanks carried out task in Tunisia, Stimson says
Strategy of holding attacks barred U.S. drive to coast in south, War Secretary explains
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SAVAGE JAP ASSAULT ON AUSTRALIA FEARED
Pacific peril called as big as late in 1941
MacArthur aide declares enemy has huge fleet massed at Truk
By Don Caswell, United Press staff writer
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Kenney says foe has edge in air in Southwest Pacific
Allies must destroy 5 planes to every one they lose
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No new millionaires –
War profits decline, but wages soar
Workers, not stockholders, getting the breaks in World War II
By Dale McFeatters
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Nightclub owner is given 15 years
Boston, Massachusetts (UP) –
Barnett Welansky, owner of the Cocoanut Grove nightclub was sentenced to 12 to 15 years in prison today for manslaughter in connection with the fire at his club last Nov. 28 which cost 491 lives.
Judge Joseph Hurley imposed the prison sentence on each of 19 counts, but ordered that they all be served concurrently – the first day in solitary confinement and the rest at hard labor. The possible maximum sentence would have been 20 years in prison.
The 46-year-old defendant, a Boston lawyer, stared ahead as sentence was pronounced.