Ward case strengthens plea for single agency for war labor issues
Delay in employees’ election is blamed for allowing seizure dispute to develop
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer
…
Aviation-minded Texas gives preview of air age
Writers in flying’s ‘promised land’ map visits to plane plants, conferences
By Henry Ward, Pittsburgh Press aviation writer
…
Bricker answers Ickes on Japs
Columbus, Ohio (UP) –
Governor John W. Bricker said today that criticism by Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes of his statement that local communities should have a voice in post-war resettlement of Japanese-Americans was an attempt “to take the mind of the country off the mismanagement of these Japanese relocation camps.”
Mr. Ickes’ criticism followed a statement by Governor Bricker that the “rights and wishes” of West Coast communities should be considered in post-war resettlement plans and that “disloyal and non-citizen Japanese should be returned to Japan.”
Governor Bricker said:
The New Dealers don’t understand the Japanese any more now than in the pre-Pearl Harbor days when they tried by a program of appeasement to handle the Japanese situation. They permitted the Japs to fortify mandated islands in violation of treaties and failed to take notice of Japanese plans which led to the disgraceful attack at Pearl Harbor and took no steps to protect ourselves.
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
In Italy – (by wireless)
Funny how nicknames change from one war to the next, and even during wars.
Last war, if I remember correctly, the Germans were almost always referred to as “Huns,” but you don’t hear the word used in this war, at least not in the rear. For the first year or so it was always “Jerry.” Now in the last few months the term “Kraut” has shown up, and it is used at the front more than any other, I guess.
The latest term is Tedeschi, the Italian word for German. The “ch” is hard, like the “k” in Kansas. About a third of the time our soldiers speak of the Germans as “the Tedeschi.”
One of the most practical pieces of equipment our Army has got around to is the little Coleman stove for cooking. It’s about eight inches high and burns gasoline. It comes in a round metal can which you can use to heat water in after you take the stove out of it.
The stove has folding legs and folding griddles which you open up to set a can or a canteen cup on. It’s easy to carry and burns without a lot of tinkering.
Almost every group of frontline soldiers has one now. They heat their C-rations on it, make coffee several times a day, heat water for shaving, and if they’re in an enclosed place such as a dugout they even use it for warmth.
You have no idea what a big thing some practical little device like a successful stove is in the life of a man at the front.
Candles now plentiful
Our Army canteen cup is pretty good, but it has one big drawback. The rolled-over rim collects so much heat you can’t put it to your lips without burning them. Hence you have to wait till your coffee is lukewarm before you can drink it.
A few soldiers I’ve noticed have partly solved the problem by cutting the rim off and filing the top smooth.
Another much-needed item that at last has shown up in good quantity is candles.
It seems to take any nation a year or two to find out through experience all the little things needed at the front, and to produce them and get them there. Last winter we needed candles, but they were as scarce as though made of gold. Now at last they have become plentiful.
They are white and about nine inches long. We either drip some tallow on a table and anchor them in it, or set them in empty cognac bottles. Of course, if you had a full cognac, you wouldn’t need a candle.
Soldiers like kids
I’ve told you time and again about the dogs our soldiers have taken as pets and mascots. Running second to dogs, I believe, are Italian kids. There’s no way of estimating how many Italian boys have been adopted by our troops, but there must be hundreds.
An outfit will pick up some kid, usually one who has been orphaned by bombing and has no home and no place to go. The children come along of their free will, of course. And they begin having the time of their lives.
The soldiers cut down extra uniforms and clothe them in straight G.I. The youngsters pick up English so fast it makes your head swim. They eat better than they have eaten in years. The whole thing is exciting and adventuresome to them. The units keep them in areas as safe as can be found when they go into action.
What will become of these kids when the war ends, I don’t know. Probably many will be carried clear back to America and their collective godfathers will try to sneak them in.
I do know of Sicilian adoptees who were brought along on the invasion of Italy, just like the animal pets. And I’ve heard of two other adoptees, already written up by some of the other correspondents, who stowed away and went on the Anzio beachhead landings on D-Day.
Freezing of jaw may kill pain in dentistry work
…
‘Fireproof’ coal termed a waste
By Robert Taylor, Press Washington correspondent
…
Observers ask –
Will MacArthur be summoned to conference?
Critics of Roosevelt hint at jealousy
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer
Washington –
There was speculation here today whether Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s unqualified disavowal of presidential aspirations would put him in line for a return to the United States for military conferences.
He is the only officer of comparable rank or command responsibilities who has not been brought back to this country for one reason or another since Pearl Harbor.
There has been no hint whether failure to include him in mainland discussions has been on his own motion or for lack of any invitation from the War Department. Some of Gen. MacArthur’s top subordinates have been back.
Jealousy a factor?
Unfriendly critics of the Roosevelt administration have suggested that Gen. MacArthur had not been summoned home because there was no desire to give him an opportunity to become the center of political demonstrations here.
Others have suggested that there was military opposition to his return on the ground that he might say something which would encourage pressure groups to demand greater allocations of men and munitions to the Southwest Pacific at the expense of the European Theater. Still others believed Gen. MacArthur could have returned anytime at his convenience but simply wanted to remain with his own command.
In any event, his return now could have slight political significance, if any. Gen. MacArthur’s statement that he would not accept the presidential nomination if tendered definitely removed him from the contest.
Roosevelt, Dewey silent
There remains now the paradoxical situation in which the only candidates with respect to whom there has been no conclusive and public statement of political intentions are the two men most generally regarded as the probable presidential contestants this year – President Roosevelt and Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York.
Mr. Dewey’s position is that he will not seek the Republican presidential nomination and that he prefers to serve out his four-year term as governor. He was elected in 1942. Mr. Roosevelt has smilingly parried questions whether he is a fourth-term candidate or would accept if nominated.
Uncertainty regarding either Mr. Roosevelt or Mr. Dewey, however, is strictly technical. The Democratic National Committee, the big city Democratic organizations in New Jersey, New York and Chicago and most of the party leaders are preparing to nominate Mr. Roosevelt. He has not said anything to dissuade them.
Neither has Mr. Dewey raised any bar to the extraordinarily successful pre-convention campaign being conducted by his admirers.
Gen. MacArthur’s contrastingly unequivocal withdrawal astonished political Washington since he had such excellent precedent for avoiding a definite statement.
The impression here is that Gen. MacArthur was a receptive – and more likely hopeful – aspirant for the Republican nomination until he learned of the unfavorable reaction to publication here of letters he had written to Rep. A. L. Miller (R-NE).
Roosevelt assailed
Mr. Miller assailed the Roosevelt administration in a letter to the general and got in return a letter saying that Gen. MacArthur agreed with the “complete wisdom and statesmanship of your comments.” The general also intimated his dissatisfaction with allocations of men and munitions to his theater.
It is possible the War Department admonished Gen. MacArthur upon publication of that correspondence and hinted that her had better get out of politics – and quickly. Something evidently changed the general’s point of view.
On April 16, three days after publication of the Miller correspondence, Gen. MacArthur issued a communiqué denying he was a presidential candidate but adding a paragraph which was accepted immediately by his supporters as meaning that he was receptive and would run if nominated.
‘Military man’ mentioned
Possibly even more illuminating was a report received in the Washington Bureau of the United Press Jan. 27 from a visitor to Gen. MacArthur’s headquarters. This summary of political sentiment was by an experienced observer and it was remarked that the dispatch passed through Gen. MacArthur’s own censorship.
Its most striking sentence was a suggestion that MacArthur believed an experienced soldier in the White House would bring an earlier victory in the war.
The report said:
It would not be surprising if MacArthur felt – as do a good many here – that the shortest way to victory would be to place an experienced military man in the White House.
The report reflected the impression at his headquarters that Gen. MacArthur would neither declare his availability nor withdraw his name from consideration for the Republican nomination, but would “let events take their course.”
Between Jan. 27 and last week, something evidently jarred Gen. MacArthur considerably to cause him to say now of the nomination, “I do not covet it nor would I accept it.”
Primaries will be held in four states this week
Washington (UP) –
One Republican and three Democratic incumbent Senators will seek renomination this week in primaries in Alabama, Florida, Maryland and South Dakota.
Maryland voters open the political activity today at primaries which and Senator Millard E. Tydings, a Democrat, opposed for renomination by four aspirants, with Willis R. Jones of Baltimore furnishing the most active opposition.
Other Senators seeking renomination this week are Claude E. Pepper (D-FL), ardent administration supporter; Listen Hill (D-AL), and Chan Gurney (R-SD).
The Maryland Republican nomination is being sought by Rives Matthews (Princess Anne publisher who recently charged a state official with misusing gasoline rations), Paul Robertson and Blanchard Randall Jr., both of Baltimore.
Eighteen delegates to the Democratic convention and 16 to the Republican – all apparently uninstructed – will also be chosen in Maryland as well as candidates for six Congressional seats.
Tomorrow’s Florida primary has attracted the greater national interest. Mr. Pepper, outspoken pre-Pearl Harbor interventionist, is opposed for renomination by four men – Jacksonville Judge Ollie Edmunds, Jacksonville lawyer Alston Cockrell, Daytona Beach lawyer Millard B. Conklin and Lake City realtor Finley Moore.
Florida will also choose 18 delegates to the Democratic convention from a ballot that includes a slate favoring Senator Harry F. Byrd (D-VA) for the presidential nomination. Most of the others favor President Roosevelt.
In Alabama, Mr. Hill is opposed for renomination by Birmingham attorney James A. Simpson.
Mr. Gurney faces opposition for the Republican senatorial nomination in South Dakota where voters will also choose 11 Republicans and eight Democrats to the national conventions.
Candidates for two Congressional seats as well as gubernatorial candidates will be chosen in South Dakota while Alabama will select candidates for nine House seats.
Delegates to national conventions will also be chosen this week in North Carolina and Washington.
Gowanus fans concede ‘Bums’ fits Dodgers
…
42 rounds at Gardens –
Indoor boxing season ends here with ‘all-star’ card
By Carl Hughes
…
Völkischer Beobachter (May 2, 1944)
England bangt um seine Zukunft –
‚…um überhaupt zu leben!‘
Lord Halifax jammert vor den USA über den Zusammenbruch der englischen Weltmachtstellung
…
Im April 153.820 BRT, 27 Zerstörer und Geleitfahrzeuge versenkt –
Weiterer Geländegewinn bei Kowel
…
U.S. Navy Department (May 2, 1944)
Communiqué No. 518
Pacific and Far East.
U.S. submarines have reported the sinking of twelve vessels, including three combatant ships, as a result of operations against the enemy in these waters, as follows:
- 1 large tanker
- 1 large naval auxiliary
- 2 medium cargo transports
- 5 medium cargo vessels
- 1 light cruiser
- 2 destroyers
These actions have not been announced in any previous Navy Department communiqué.
CINCPAC Communiqué No. 44
Powerful Naval Task Forces of the Pacific Fleet under command of VAdm. Marc A. Mitscher, USN, have completed further attacks against enemy bases in the Central Pacific following their operations in support of the Hollandia-Humboldt Bay occupation.
Installations in Truk Atoll were attacked by carrier aircraft on April 29‑30 (West Longitude Date); Satawan, in the Nomoi Islands, was attacked by carrier‑based aircraft and shelled by cruisers under the command of RAdm. J. B. Oldendorf, USN, on April 30; Ponape was attacked by carrier‑based aircraft on May 1 and shelled by battleships commanded by VAdm. W. A. Lee, USN. None of our ships was damaged in any of these operations, and our aircraft losses were light. Approximately 30 flight personnel are missing.
In the first day’s attack on Truk, 60 enemy planes were shot down in air combat, an equal number destroyed on the ground. Five enemy planes were shot down by our ships.
In the second day’s attack at Truk, the one enemy plane encountered was shot down. Our planes dropped eight hundred tons of bombs in the Truk area, inflicting heavy damage to shore facilities.
Considerable damage was caused by our protracted shelling and bombing of Satawan and Ponape.
Our ships shot down five enemy search planes on April 26 during the retirement from the Hollandia Area.
CINCPAC Press Release No. 385
For Immediate Release
May 2, 1944
Wake Island was bombed by 7th Army Air Force Liberators on April 30 (West Longitude Date). Ninety‑five tons of bombs were dropped on defense installations. Moderate anti-aircraft fire was encountered. Several enemy planes were in the air over the target but did not attempt interception. All of our planes returned.
Ponape Island was bombed on April 30 by 7th Army Air Force Mitchell bombers. Explosions and fires were caused at an airfield. Antiaircraft was moderate.
Remaining enemy positions in the Marshalls were attacked on April 30 by Dauntless dive bombers and Corsair fighters of the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, Mitchell bombers of the 7th Army Air Force, and Navy Hellcat fighters.