President runs long shot risk for Wallace
Roosevelt silence stirs hopes of score
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer
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G.I.’s overseas now often see movies first
Bottlenecks cleared by added projectors
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De Gaullists prove adept in civil affairs
They take over in Caen with efficiency
By L. S. B. Shapiro, North American Newspaper Alliance
Caen, France –
Gen. Charles de Gaulle’s organization for the relief and rehabilitation of liberated French towns and cities is proving so brilliantly effective in the case of Caen that the pretentious preparation of Allied Civil Affairs detachments seem, to some extent, superfluous.
Even before British and Canadian troops entered the city, resistance leaders loyal to Gen. de Gaulle had, by popular consent, taken over the local administration, food control and health services with the result that Allied officers found that only limited material aid was required of them. Today, Caen is being administered by Fighting French officials acting in cordial liaison with Allied military authorities.
Allies are delighted
Allied civil officers are frankly delighted with this situation. A Canadian colonel charged with Caen’s civilian relief told this correspondent today:
The French authorities are working beautifully. What they need is our help, which is thankfully received. They asked us for oil to work a generator in a big hospital for the pumping machinery with which to restore the water system, soap, medical supplies and a very limited supply of staple foods. These we had prepared and were able to furnish immediately.
Everything else was fully organized by the officials acting under the de Gaulle organization. The city is being administered to the post by Gen. de Gaulle long in advance of D-Day.
The French preparations were meticulous, even to medical orderlies and cooks recruited from among French women in England. They all have been working magnificently with our civil affairs officers and our field commanders.
Within a few hours of the entry of our troops, the French administrators had requisitioned civilian trucks for the evacuation of homeless refugees to Bayeux. Only 3,000 required evacuation, some 30,000 electing to remain in Caen. Civilian casualties thus far counted are below advance estimates. About 650 were found in a hospital and there are about 600 civilian dead.
Worked with underground
The net result of Gen. de Gaulle’s ambitious preparations for civilian relief is that his appointees are everywhere and assuming complete control. This fits in with the plans of Allied Civil Affairs detachments whose instructions are to hand over the civil administration to the French as quickly as they can handle it. And de Gaulle appointees are quick as lightning in presenting the administrative fait accompli in every liberated town.
Everything points to the conclusion that Gen. de Gaulle made his preparations through Underground channels within France long before our invasion. Local leaders and rehabilitation problems were determined the moment Gen. de Gaulle took formal control of the resistance movement in July 1942.
McGlincy: Only one robot hits beachhead
By James F. McGlincy, United Press staff writer
U.S. 1st Army HQ, France – (July 13, delayed)
A German pilotless plane, either by accident or design, plummeted into the American sector on the eastern end of the Allied line in Normandy recently.
No other pilotless planes have landed on our front since then, and it is still uncertain whether this single instance was an error or an experiment by the Nazis. American officers said the Germans might have sent over the plane as a test, but the fact that there has not been any repeat performance led them to believe that it was an accident, probably due to a bad rudder or some other mechanical defect.
Nevertheless, it was conceded that the plane might have been launched from the runways later discovered in the Cherbourg area which at that time had not yet been captured.
The lone flying bomb did not land near any military installations and inflicted only minor damage.
Lt. Gardner Botsford of New York City, who investigated the incident, said that despite the tremendous explosion, the flying bomb failed to dent the earth. Pieces of metal were scattered for 100 yards but, Lt. Botsford reported, there weren’t enough to pick up or even try to begin to put together.
Allied air mastery over invasion coast stops Luftwaffe, helps secure beachhead
London, England –
Seven days of air superiority over the Normandy beachheads played a vital part in making possible the successful start of the invasion of Europe. In those crucial seven days, Allied fighters and bombers flew 56,000 sorties, smashed 42,000 tons of bombs against the German defenders and destroyed 397 enemy planes.
The Luftwaffe, weakened by the long assault on replacement factories in Germany and years of combat against the ever-increasingly powerful U.S. and British air forces, was swept completely from the skies those first few nervous days. Even the German radio admitted that the Nazis seldom dared move troops or supplies except at night.
Douglas transports began the invasion five hours before H-Hour when they roared across the Channel. In eight hours, they dropped an army of 35,000 to 50,000 airborne troops behind German lines by glider and parachute.
After dawn, a train of them, 50 miles long and nine planes wide, rushed good, guns, artillery, ammunition and reinforcements.
On the second day, engineers were needed. Again, the transports took off to ferry over men to build the first Allied airstrip in France. From the second day on, the C-47s flew wounded back to England.
Meanwhile, Allied fighter-bombers and medium bombers were throwing an almost impenetrable air blanket over the beachhead. Fighters flew cover, smashed troop concentrations and hit strongpoints. Medium bombers severed the last Seine bridges to cut off Nazi reinforcements. Heavy bombers raised havoc with targets farther behind the front.
The completeness of Allied air superiority was made possible in part by the tremendous pounding given Germany by the Allied air forces for long months before.
In May, Americans and British hit Nazi Europe with 154,380 tons of bombs, averaging more than 200 tons an hour, day and night, for the entire pre-invasion month.
Well over half the U.S. fighters, bombers and transports participating in the long pre-invasion assault as well as the actual invasion of Fortress Europe are equipped with Pratt & Whitney engines and Hamilton Standard propellers.
Chamber urges U.S. air policy; win war, keep peace, foster trade
Scope of airpower widens as Army unleashes Superfortresses, Navy reveals ‘Task Force 58’ roving Pacific, CAB outlines 20 world routes
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Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
In Normandy, France – (by wireless)
The hospital was in our hands but just surely. On up the street a block there seemed to be fighting. I say seemed to be, because actually you can’t always tell. Street fighting is just as confusing as field fighting.
One side will bang away for a while, then the other side. Between these sallies there are long lulls, with only stray and isolated shots. Just an occasional soldier is sneaking about, and you don’t see anything of the enemy at all. You can’t tell half the time just what the situation us, and neither can the soldiers.
About a block beyond the hospital entrance, two American tanks were sitting in the middle of the street, one about 50 yards ahead of the other. I walked toward them. Our infantrymen were in doorways along the street.
I got within about 50 feet of our front tank when it let go its 75mm gun. The blast was terrific there in the narrow street. Glass came tinkling down from nearby windows, smoke puffed around the tank, and the empty street was shaking and trembling with the concussion.
As the tank continued to shoot, I ducked into a doorway, because I figured the Germans would shoot back. Inside the doorway there was a sort of street-level cellar, dirt-floored. Apparently there was a wine shop above, for the cellar was stacked with wire crates for holding wine bottles on their sides. There were lots of bottles, but they were all empty.
Crew comes boiling out of turret
I went back to the doorway and stood peeking out at the tank. It started backing up. Then suddenly a yellow flame pierced the bottom of the tank and there was a crash of such intensity that I automatically blinked my eyes. The tank, hardly 50 feet from where I was standing, had been hit by an enemy shell.
A second shot ripped the pavement at the side of the tank. There was smoke all around, but the tank didn’t catch fire. In a moment, the crew came boiling out of the turret.
Grim as it was, I almost had to laugh as they ran toward us. I never have seen men run so violently. They ran all over, with arms and heads going up and down and with marathon race grimaces. They plunged into my doorway.
I spent the next excited hour with them. we changed to another doorway and sat on boxes in the empty hallway. The floor and steps were thick with blood where a soldier had been treated within the hour.
What had happened to the tank was this: They had been firing away at a pillbox ahead when their 75 backfired, filling the tank with smoke and blinding them.
They decided to back up in order to get their bearings, but after backing a few yards the driver was so blinded that he stopped. Unfortunately, he stopped exactly at the foot of a side street. More unfortunately, there was another German pillbox up the side street/ all the Germans had to do was take east aim and let go at the sitting duck.
The first shot hit a tread, so the tank couldn’t move. That was when the boys got out. I don’t know why the Germans didn’t fire at them as they poured out.
The escaped tankers naturally were excited, but they were as jubilant as June-bugs and ready for more. They never had been in combat before the invasion of Normandy, yet in three weeks their tank had been shot up three times. Each time it was repaired and put back in action. And it can be repaired again this time. The name of their tank, appropriately, is Be Back Soon.
*Leave tank motor running
The main worry of these boys was the fact that they had left the engine running. We could hear it chugging away. It’s bad for a tank motor to idle very long. But now they were afraid to go back and turn the motor off, for the tank was still right in line with the hidden German gun.
Also, they had come out wearing their leather crash helmets. Their steel helmets were still inside the tank, so were their rifles.
“We’ll be a lot of good without helmets or rifles!” one of them said.
The crew consisted of Cpl. Martin Kennelly of Chicago (the tank commander), Sgt, L. Wortham of Leeds, Alabama (driver), Pvt. Ralph Ogren of Minneapolis (assistant driver), Cpl. Albin Stoops of Marshalltown, Delaware (gunner), and Pvt. Charles Rains of Kansas City (the loader).
Pvt. Rains was the oldest of the bunch, and the only married one. He used to work as a guard at the Sears-Roebuck plant in Kansas City.
“I was MP to 1,500 women,” he said with a grin, “and how I’d like to be back doing that!”
The other tankers all expressed loud approval of this sentiment.
Völkischer Beobachter (July 16, 1944)
Die Hauptstadt der Bewegung in der Bewährung –
Das Verbrechen von München
Neue Verwüstungen und Zerstörungen von Wohnbauten und weltberühmten Kulturstätten
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Örtliche Angriffe in der Normandie verlustreich abgewiesen –
Neuer Großangriff des Gegners in Italien
Erwarteter Sowjetangriff im Raum von Tarnopol und Luzk in harten Kämpfen abgewiesen
dnb. Aus dem Führerhauptquartier, 15. Juli –
Das Oberkommando der Wehrmacht gibt bekannt:
Im Abschnitt von Caen verlief der Tag ohne besondere Kampfhandlungen. Auf Grund der an den Vortagen erlittenen hohen Verluste führte der Feind nur örtliche Angriffe östlich und nordöstlich Saint-Lô sowie im Abschnitt zwischen Pont Hébert und Sainteny. Er wurde überall verlustreich abgewiesen.
Schlachtfliegerkräfte unterstützten die Kämpfe des Heeres im Landekopf und griffen belegte Ortschaften sowie Bereitstellungen des Feindes mit guter Wirkung an. 21 feindliche Flugzeuge wurden in Luftkämpfen abgeschossen.
Im französischen Raum wurden wiederum 37 Terroristen Im Kampf niedergemacht.
Schweres Vergeltungsfeuer liegt auf London.
An der italienischen Front nahm der Feind mit zusammengefassten starken Kräften seinen Großangriff gegen unsere Stellungen zwischen der ligurischen Küste und Poggibonsi wieder auf. In erbitterten Kämpfen wichen unsere Truppen wenige Kilometer nach Norden aus. Poggibonsi ging nach schweren Straßenkämpfen verloren.
Im Abschnitt südöstlich Arezzo und beiderseits des Tiber wurden starke Angriffe des Feindes zum Teil im Gegenstoß abgewiesen.
Nördlich Fabriano und westlich Filottrano wurden unsere Gefechtsvorposten auf die Hauptstellung zurückgenommen.
Sicherungsfahrzeuge der Kriegsmarine versenkten im Golf von Genua ein britisches Schnellboot.
Im Südabschnitt der Ostfront traten die Bolschewisten im Raum von Tarnopol und Luzk zu dem erwarteten Angriff an. Sie wurden gestern in harten Kämpfen unter Vernichtung zahlreicher Panzer abgewiesen, einzelne Einbrüche abgeriegelt.
Im Mittelabschnitt erwehrten sich unsere zäh kämpfenden Divisionen der fortgesetzten sowjetischen Durchbruchsversuche durch energische Gegenstöße.
Im Seengebiet nördlich Wilna, beiderseits der Düna sowie im Raum von Opotschka wurden die auf breiter Front weitergeführten Durchbruchsversuche der Sowjets im Wesentlichen blutig abgeschlagen. Unsere Truppen säuberten einzelne Einbruchsstellen.
Die Luftwaffe griff mit starken Schlachtfliegerkräften an den Schwerpunkten in die Kämpfe ein und vernichtete in Tiefangriffen zahlreiche sowjetische Panzer, Geschütze und Fahrzeuge. 87 feindliche Flugzeuge wurden durch Jagdflieger und Flakartillerie abgeschossen. In der Nacht bekämpften Kampf- und Nachtschlachtflugzeuge den sowjetischen Nachschubverkehr und Truppenansammlungen des Feindes mit guter Wirkung.
Ein nordamerikanischer Bomberverband führte einen Terrorangriff gegen Budapest. Durch deutsche und ungarische Luftverteidigungskräfte wurden zwölf feindliche Flugzeuge vernichtet.
In der Nacht warfen einzelne britische Flugzeuge Bomben im Raum von Hannover.
US-Flieger bestätigt Bombenterror –
‚Gemäß erhaltenem Befehl‘
Paris, 15. Juli –
Der Führer der Französischen Volkspartei, Jacques Doriot, der an der Normandiefront weilte, gab der Pariser Presse Erklärungen über die Einstellung der amerikanischen Kriegsgefangenen. Keiner von denen, die er gesprochen habe, seien Freiwillige gewesen. Sie schienen müde zu sein und wünschen, daß der Krieg bald zu Ende gehe. Die meisten wüssten überhaupt nicht, wofür sie kämpften. Ein amerikanischer Flieger, den er gefragt habe, wofür er die Zivilbevölkerung massakriert habe, habe gesagt, daß er seine Bomben „gemäß erhaltenen Befehlen irgendwo abgeworfen“ habe.
Bretton Woods braucht Sowietgold
Lissabon, 15. Juli –
Wegen fehlender Instruktionen aus Moskau kann der Sowjetdelegierte Stepanow den Währungskonferenzlern in Bretton Woods immer noch nicht angeben, welche Goldsumme die Sowjetunion dem projektierten Stabilisierungsfonds beisteuern will. Der Konferenzsprecher bedauerte, daß durch die Moskauer Schweigsamkeit die Verhandlungen einstweilen stoppen mußten.
Supreme HQ Allied Expeditionary Force (July 16, 1944)
Communiqué No. 81
Hard infantry fighting in close country continued yesterday all along the western sectors of the Allied front. Limited advances were made at a number of points notably south of the SAINTENY–PÉRIERS road and on the northern and eastern approaches to SAINT-LÔ.
In a dusk attack in the ÉVRECY area, the village of ESQUAY was captured and at midnight our troops had advanced some little distance beyond it.
Fighter-bombers penetrated 150 miles south of PARIS yesterday evening to attack transportation and supply targets in the NEVERS–BOURGES–ORLÉANS–TOURS area.
Last night, the rail centers at NEVERS and CHÂLONS-SUR-MARNE were attacked by a force of heavy bombers.
Nine enemy aircraft were destroyed in the air during yesterday’s operations. Fourteen of ours are missing.
Communiqué No. 82
Allied advances have continued on the western sector of the front.
Troops moving south on the CARENTAN–MARIGNY road have taken the village of LA TIBOTERIE. Gains have been reported south of LE HOMMET-D’ARTHENAY.
Attacking towards SAINT-LÔ from the northeast, our troops have advanced more than a mile, taking the village of EMELIE. They have reached a point within 1,500 yards of SAINT-LÔ itself, where enemy infantry today was also subjected to attack by our medium bombers.
Further east, in the TILLY–ÉVRECY area, our troops have occupied BRETTEVILLETTE. Last night’s attack through ESQUAY was developed to the west some 4,000 yards along high ground north of ÉVRECY. The enemy salient created by this attack was eliminated this morning with the occupation of GAVRUS and BOUGY.
In addition to attacking enemy frontline positions, our medium bombers, escorted by fighters, struck at rail targets at PARIS, DREUX, GRANVILLE and near ARGENTAN. Bridges at BOISSEI-LA-LANDE, AMBRIÈRES and near DREUX were also attacked.
None of our aircraft is missing.
Fighters which had escorted heavy day bombers to GERMANY this morning, attacked rail traffic at LUNÉVILLE and strafed airfield installations in BELGIUM.
Coastal aircraft attacked enemy shipping in the eastern Channel early this morning.
U.S. Navy Department (July 16, 1944)
CINCPAC Press Release No. 476
For Immediate Release
July 16, 1944
Guam Island was attacked on July 15 (West Longitude Date) by aircraft of a fast carrier task group. Bombs and rockets destroyed or damaged buildings and caused fires among bivouac areas. A dive bomber was shot down but landed in the water two miles off Guam where the crew was picked up by one of our destroyers.
On July 15, rocket‑firing carrier planes attacked ground installations on Rota Island. Fires were started and a direct hit scored on a concentration of automotive and railroad equipment.
Iwo Jima in the Volcano Islands was attacked July 13 by low-flying Liberators of Group One, Fleet Air Wing Two. A Japanese destroyer was hit squarely by a 500‑pound bomb. Explosions and fires resulted after one 6,000‑ton and one 3,000‑ton cargo ship were strafed. A destroyer escort, a coastal ship and 12 smaller craft were heavily strafed. An oil dump was set afire and five other fires were started. Three Japanese airplanes on the ground at the time of the attack on the south field were believed destroyed and 10 damaged by strafing. There was no enemy airborne interception. Intense anti-aircraft fire slightly damaged one of our planes.
Fourth Marine Aircraft Wing Corsair fighters and Dauntless dive bombers bombed Japanese anti-aircraft and coastal gun positions in the Marshall Islands on July 14. Gun emplacements were strafed. Meager anti-aircraft fire damaged one of our planes.
The Pittsburgh Press (July 16, 1944)
YANKS CLOSE ON THREE NAZI BASES
Bradley’s men sweep through 25 more towns
Battle into Lessay and Saint-Lô, near Périers
By Phil Ault, United Press staff writer
Pushing forward slowly, U.S. forces in Normandy almost had “in the bag” the three Nazi bases of Lessay, Saint-Périers and Saint-Lô. The Americans stormed into the outskirts of Lessay (1), gained four miles north of Périers (2), and were a mile from Saint-Lô. The British front in the Caen area (4) was quiet with a big new offensive in prospect.
SHAEF, London, England – (July 15)
U.S. troops battled today into the outskirts of Lessay, west coast anchor of the German line, and swept through 25 more villages in gains up to four miles across a front stretching east to Saint-Lô, where the Yanks launched a knockout attack on that key road center.
CBS correspondent Larry LeSueur reported that the Germans evacuated Lessay as the Americans entered the outskirts under a protective shell barrage.
A great test of arms, perhaps one of the decisive armored battles of the war, was declared officially to be impending around Caen, on the British wing of the front as the Germans began a drumfire barrage in preparation for a massive counterattack.
Two miles from Périers
A German Army estimated at 100,000 men was lurching slowly backward under the steady American pounding which carried Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s troops to within two miles of a third enemy bastion, Périers, six miles southeast of Lessay.
The doughboys smashed down to the Ay River estuary on an eight-mile front from the sea to east of Lessay and pushed a spearhead within 300 yards of the heart of the small port which German rearguards were defending bitterly.
Getting across the Ay, flooded by the Germans to a width of several miles, presented a serious problem but the companion advance in the Périers direction was threatening to outflank the water barrier.
Ground regained at Saint-Lô
For the fifth straight day, the Yanks launched a dawn attack on Saint-Lô, this time starting suddenly without a preparatory barrage and in the first hour driving back to the area of Martinville, a mile east of the wrecked city, after having given ground in that area Friday under counterattacks.
Saint-Lô was virtually encircled with the Americans holding dominant ground on all but its south and southwest approaches. The new attack was called officially a “strong action” designed to bring about Saint-Lô’s fall.
The heaviest enemy shelling since the Saint-Lô attacks began met the U.S. infantrymen and a few German tanks rumbled into action, precipitating heavy battles which were reported still raging late Saturday.
Massive infantry surge
United Press’ James C. McGlincy reported that Saturday’s advances on Saint-Lô consisted of the reduction of three powerfully fortified hedgerows in close-quarters fighting recalling the massive infantry surges of the last war.
German SS Elite Guard officers were threatening to shoot the city’s defenders if they wavered, another United Press front reporter, Henry T. Gorrell, said, “and even the cocky paratroopers, the cream of the German Army, now are digging furiously to stem the machine-like advance of the U.S. Army.”
These desperate measures were costing the Yanks heavily for every yard gained, but slowly and surely the front reports said, the Germans were giving way and suffering enormous losses which were almost impossible for them to replace.
Yanks bury 6,349 Nazis
It was announced that since D-Day, the Yanks have buried 6,349 German soldiers whose bodies had been left behind by their retreating comrades.
The Americans advanced a mile on a four-mile front in the Lessay sector, maintaining their mile-a-day pace since launching their attack down the west side of the Cherbourg (Cotentin) Peninsula 12 days ago.
The most sweeping gains of the day, up to four miles, came in the center sector above Périers where the Americans plunged ahead at an accelerated pace after joining up
They captured Saint-Patrice-de-Claids, three miles north of Périers and six towns on the northeast approaches of the town, and Crèvecœur and Deauville on the road from Saint-Jores.
The Americans drove within a mile of the important Lessay–Saint-Lô lateral road, putting it within easy field piece range and limiting the Germans’ use of it, captured in this sector were La Grande Hairie and La Creterie.
The Americans were driving on without air support through a heavy ground fog and an intermittent drizzle in advances which placed Saint-Lô, Lessay and Périers within their immediate grasp.
Shortly before noon Friday, Gen. Bradley had ordered his troops to step up the attack on the three resistance centers. Slowly, like a creeping tide, the front was squaring out as the Yankees gained elbow room which will pay heavy dividends when armor is thrown into the battle on a grand scale.
Every sign pointed to the early beginning of the biggest battle of the invasion in the Caen sector, where about 200,000 German troops with the better part of six panzer divisions were aligned against Lt. Gen. Sir Miles C. Dempsey’s British 2nd Army.
Nazi attack expected
The entire British sector was ominously quiet except for patrolling and the swelling German barrage which a commentator said meant that “there is pending a very large-scale German attack.”
The attack was anticipated with some satisfaction for the best formula for sweeping advances is to smash the enemy’s armor in one major battle, as Gen. Sir B. L. Montgomery demonstrated in his desert campaigns.
A front dispatch from Ronald Clark, United Press writer with the British said a flood of Allied men and material was pouring into the Anglo-Canadian line.
The air forces were able to put in only 1,000 sorties Friday, one-eleventh of D-Day’s display, but fighters scored heavily in dogfights with German formations, shooting down 25 enemy planes.
Only about 50 sorties were flown during Saturday’s muggy forenoon.
List of Jap brutalities grows with execution of Superfortress crewmen
Enemy radio says fliers seized in June 15 raid met same fate as Doolittle’s men
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Only replacements now –
Armed Forces fill quotas of 11 million men
Youths, 18, to meet most draft needs
By Paul Harrison, United Press staff writer
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Ploești refineries fired by Yanks
750 heavies attack from Italian bases
By Walter Cronkite, United Press staff writer
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Boat carrying Gen. Clark fired on by U.S. warship
Fifth Army leader nearly hit; two killed
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Japs on Guam hit 11th straight day
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Bellboy attacks film singing star
Jeanette MacDonald’s face cut and bruised
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Plant making B-24 bombers closed
18,000 sent home after strike ends
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