Background of news –
The House and foreign affairs
By Bertram Benedict
…
Pipeline plans shift to suit Egyptian King
Farouk first said no; then he says maybe
By Henry J. Taylor, Scripps-Howard staff writer
…
Wanton waste of funds charged
$65-million plant now idle
…
Poll: Rank and file in the West back Dewey
New York Governor reached new high
By George Gallup, Director, American Institute of Public Opinion
…
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
With 5th Army beachhead forces, Italy – (by wireless)
One night I stayed in an officers’ dugout with Maj. Asbury Lee of Clearfield, Pennsylvania, and Capt. Charles H. Hollis of Clemson, South Carolina.
Maj. Lee is commander of a tank battalion. His nickname is “Az,” and his father-in-law owns the “Lee-Hoffman’s Famous Foods” restaurant in Cresson, Pennsylvania. Maj. Lee has a boy named Asbury Lee IV and a baby named Robert E. Lee.
Capt. Hollis is Maj. Lee’s executive, and was a good friend of the late correspondent Ben Robertson, who came from his hometown.
It was very dark in the dugout when Capt. Hollis got up to start the fire in the stove next morning. He fumbled around on the dirt floor for papers to use as kindling, threw in a handful, and finally got the fire going.
A little later he discovered that he had burned up three rolls of film that Maj. Lee had taken in the last few days. Later on, he discovered that he hadn’t burned up the film after all. Life at the front is very confusing.
After breakfast, Maj. Lee and I got in a jeep and drove a couple of miles up to where two companies of his tanks were bivouacked just back of the infantry.
On the way up we were sailing along across a rise when, “Bang,” an 88 shell landed 20 yards to the side of us. Aren’t you getting tired of hearing about shells landing 20 yards from me? In case you’re not, I sure am.
German fliers downed
Two minutes after this small episode we heard noises in the sky and looked up, and here came two planes falling earthward with smoke swirling behind them. Both hit just over the rise from us, close together and only a few seconds apart.
Only one parachute came down. It took it a long time, and the aviator lay very still when he hit the earth. Our medics ran out with a stretcher and got him. He was a German. A 20mm bullet had hit him from behind and lodged in his stomach. An ambulance came and took him away.
The boys cut up his parachute to make scarves, and cut one off for me. But I told them I already had two – one American and one German – and to give it to somebody else.
Hats off to infantry
After this exciting beginning of a new day, I went around picking up tank lore.
I found that tankers, like everybody else, take their hats off to the infantry.
The average doughfoot or airman says you’d never get him shut up in a tank. Once in a while you do get a tankman who has a feeling of claustrophobia about being cooped up in there, but it’s very seldom.
The boys say that more than half of them get safely out of damaged tanks, even the ones that catch fire. They tell funny stories about how four and five men come out of a burning tank all at once, when it isn’t actually possible for more than two to get through the door at the same time.
They hate snipers worse than anything else. That is because visibility is pretty poor in a tank and the commander usually rides with his door open and his head sticking out. Unseen snipers are always shooting at them.
Improvements on tanks
The boys showed me all the little improvements that have come out on recent tanks. And they also wondered why tank designers haven’t thought of some of the simplest things for making tank life more practical – such as putting racks for water cans on the rear, and a bracket where you could tie your bedding roll.
The men have welded on these necessary racks for their gear.
An armored unit’s fighting usually comes in spurts, with long intervals between.
When the tank boys are in a lull, they are used for emergency jobs. This is very unusual, but here on the beachhead everybody has to do a little of everything.
Nearly every day the men of the tank crews back in bivouac have a detail starting just at dawn. They carry mines and barbed wire up to the front for the engineers to put in place. They pack the stuff on their backs, and they don’t like it, but they do it without grumbling.
OWI’ll tell the world –
Lucey: Super press agentry of war effort bulges overseas waste baskets
By Charles T. Lucey, Scripps-Howard staff writer
…
3 employers cited by WLB to President
Montgomery Ward tilt piles up record load
…
Ickes fears shift in coal controls
New bituminous act points to President
…
Currency plan discussed by U.S., Russia
Exploratory talks being conducted
…
Reserve lifts bond holdings to new peak
Buys $316 million of U.S. securities
…
Al Capone’s chief aide goes on ‘ride’
Whether he’s dead or alive is puzzle
…
‘Junior Miss’ picked from 1,000
Patricia Peardon wins comedy role
…
Pirates resume series with Tigers
Preacher Roe gets test for opening game
By Dick Fortune
…
Dodgers show attack wallop; Olmo big gun
…
Some students under 26 may be deferred
State draft director must approve 2-As
…
Admiral will head Public Relations
…
U.S. interference in schools scored
…
Kritik eines US-Sozialisten –
Gegen Churchills Bluffpolitik
Genf, 14. April –
Der Führer der Sozialisten in USA, Norman Thomas, hat, wie Daily Telegraph meldet, ein neues Buch geschrieben, in dem er die englische Arbeiterpartei und Winston Churchill scharf angreift. Thomas bezeichnet die englischen Versprechen, den Indern die Selbstverwaltung zu gewähren, sobald sich die indischen Parteien einigten, als Bluff, wenn nicht als glatte Heuchelei. Er wendet sich gegen Churchill wegen dessen offensichtlicher Politik, „das herrschende Empire zu retten, gleichgültig wie viele alliierten Länder dabei draufgehen.“ England, so sagt er in dem Buch, das den Titel trägt: Was ist unser Schicksal? habe zwar manche Erfahrungen in der Verwaltung des Empire, aber nach dem Kriege werde es in allen wesentlichen Fragen weit hinter den USA zurückstehen.