America at war! (1941--) -- Part 2

Army’s Davis newest gift to stardom

By Carl Lundquist, United Press staff writer


Joe Louis’ wife to go on stage

By Jack Cuddy, United Press staff writer

Senator raps tactic of ICC

Charges commission with ‘short-changing’ PRR

Dorsey and new wife agree she won’t sing

Band contracts set precedent for radio
By Si Steinhauser

Völkischer Beobachter (October 21, 1943)

Neuer Kurs in Washington

U.S. Navy Department (October 21, 1943)

CINCPAC Press Release No. 161

For Immediate Release
October 21, 1943

A small force of Navy Liberator bombers attacked Japanese-held Tarawa Island, in the Gilbert Group, on October 19, West Longitude Date. Considerable anti-aircraft opposition was encountered, but no enemy aircraft were sighted. Our forces suffered no damage.

The Pittsburgh Press (October 21, 1943)

Exchanged U.S. prisoner reports –
Hamburg mobs lynch two American fliers

Freed Yank, who heard of deaths, says he had narrow escape
By Jack Fleischer, United Press staff writer

Göteborg, Sweden –
A U.S. flier reported today that he and his companions barely escaped angry mobs near Hamburg after an air raid on the city and said that he had heard “reliably” that two Americans had been lynched there.

Sgt. Benny Springer, 22, of Denver, Colorado, who is aboard a British liner en route home from a prison camp, said he probably would have been killed had a civilian mob been able to catch him after his bomber crashed near Hamburg three months ago.

He was included in Allied troops who were exchanged here for German prisoners.

He offered no details of the reports on the lynching but some others among the group of 17 Americans and 4,322 other Allied prisoners exchanged here said that they had similar second-hand information on the incident.

The cabled information from Göteborg did not identify the Americans who were supposed to have been lynched by the Germans, but they were presumably members of the Armed Forces, possibly Air Force men like Sgt. Springer.

Bitter against raiders

Sgt. Springer’s experience confirmed reports that German civilians were so bitter against the Allied airmen that they tried repeatedly to mob them.

While they agreed that the German military made every effort to protect their prisoners, Sgt. Springer and other fliers said the civilians sometimes were able to mistreat captured airmen.

He said:

I was in the Fortress raid on Hamburg on July 25. About 60 German fighters bunched up on us and flak was all around. One engine was knocked out and then numbers three and four went out, but we reached the target and dropped all our bombs and then all of us bailed out.

Landed near soldiers

I landed about 30 kilometers from Hamburg, almost in the arms of three German soldiers. I was shot up by the flak and needed attention. The soldiers took me to where seven other Americans were gathered and herded us into a boxcar for a two-hour ride to Lüneburg.

We got out there to catch another train, but then the fun began. A large, angry crowd gathered at the station and called us every kind of name – in pretty good English – and let us know what they’d do if they got hold of us.

One fellow shouting into a loudspeaker got the crowd madder and madder. His favorite expression was “American swine.”

Crowd throws rocks

The crowd threw rocks and poured hot coffee on us. Our guards got scared and said we had to beat it. We ducked through alleys and backyards in the blackout, toward the police station. We were almost there when we ran into another crowd trying to get to the station ahead of us.

We finally made it, and later were transferred into trucks and driven to a Luftwaffe base, where we were put into solitary confinement rooms like cells, with wooden bunks, bars on the windows and the doors locked.

Sgt. Springer said that a couple of the soldiers promised the Americans guns if the crowd opened fire.

The Allied sailing, coinciding with the departure of the German hospital ships Meteor and Rügen with 835 repatriated Germans, was marred by only one tragic note. A tubercular patient died aboard one of the Britain-bound vessels during the night.

8th Army threatening Nazis’ flank

Clark masses forces for front attack on new German line
By Richard D. McMillan, United Press staff writer

Up to Volturno –
Yanks’ losses in Italy 6,774

879 in 5th Army killed, Stimson discloses

Aussies smash Jap assaults

Check Finschhafen drive; 200 dead counted
By Don Caswell, United Press staff writer

7.5-hour day for miners is proposed

Operators give alternate plan to Illinois pay pact

Brown quits OPA; Bowles next in line

Administrator asserts price control now ‘defined’

Pyle’s latest book bought by movies

Los Angeles, California – (special)
Lester Cowan, independent film producer, announced today that he had arranged to purchase the film rights to Ernie Pyle’s book on the North African campaign, Here is Your War, which Henry Holt & Company will publish Oct. 28.

Mr. Cowan said:

The film version of Mr. Pyle’s book will be a realistic and accurate treatment of his historic story of the American troops. It will also depict the life of the heroic newspaper correspondents who live, eat, sleep and march with our troops.

He spoke of Mr. Pyle as “America’s No. 1 soldier of the press.”

I DARE SAY —
Cup o’ kindness

By Florence Fisher Parry

Publishers urge new cut in newsprint inventories

Advisory Committee recommends reduction to offset partially 16% supply deficiency

Overspending by Army denied

Patterson defends handling of war contracts

Second front plea renewed by Soviet press

Foreign ministers hold third session; 2 views on conference

Army goal: 7,700,000

Washington –
Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson said today the Army has not changed its plans to have 7,700,000 men and women in uniform by Dec. 31 and indicated that it plans to take only 75,000 a month – the normal replacement rate – after Jan. 1.

U.S. Gilberts raid reported by Tokyo

By the United Press

The Japanese Dōmei News Agency said today that six U.S. Liberator bombers attacked unidentified targets in the Gilbert Islands yesterday but were driven off without causing any damage.

The broadcast did not claim the destruction of any of the raiders.

A small force of Navy Liberators last week attacked Makin Island, northernmost of the Gilberts, which Jap sources have hinted would be the target for a big American naval offensive.

Wounded reporter gets Purple Heart

Simms: Hull expected to be firm on questions of principle

Secretary may reiterate at parley U.S. policy of non-recognition of rights obtained by force
By William Philip Simms, Scripps-Howard staff writer