The Pittsburgh Press (September 23, 1944)
Rescuers near air army; Yanks capture Stolberg
Patton smashes Nazi attacks to the south, knocks out 320 tanks
By Virgil Pinkley, United Press staff writer
Driving to the rescue of a trapped airborne force near Arnhem, Holland, the British 2nd Army today reached one encircled unit on the south bank of the upper branch of the Rhine. The U.S. 1st Army captured Stolberg, but to the south was forced back across the Luxembourg border near Diekirch. The U.S. 3rd Army defeated the Germans in a tank battle in the area bounded by Château-Salins, Dieuze and Lunéville. The U.S. 7th Army of the 6th Army Group crossed the Moselle River below Épinal and drove against Belfort.
Bulletin
SHAEF, London, England –
A wild battle raged between Nijmegen and Eindhoven in Holland today as massed German forces led by 200 tanks drove a wedge across the British 2nd Army corridor between the two towns. Latest reports to headquarters said the issue was still in doubt.
SHAEF, London, England –
British tanks and armored cars careened through a blazing four-mile corridor of German guns to the south bank of the upper branch of the Rhine today, rescued a trapped band of paratroopers there and drove for the Arnhem bridge in a desperate race to relieve the main airborne force pocketed across the river.
Front reports said the highway span over the upper Rhine to Arnhem was still standing when the British armor reached the river after a wild ride up the Nijmegen–Arnhem highway from Elst, four miles to the south.
The British tank columns loosed a heavy barrage of cannon and machine-gun fire on German positions around the trapped airborne force in Arnhem, and headquarters spokesmen said the situation inside the town had improved considerably with the arrival of the relief party on the south side of the river.
The wearied sky troops were still fighting grimly and well to keep their foothold in the doorway to Germany, but it was admitted that their situation, after more than six days of close-quarters slugging, was touch and go.
A dramatic radio message from the airborne commander in Arnhem said the morale of his troops was high and that they would hold out in their “patch of hell” until relieved, but observers believed relief must come quickly.
Elsewhere on the long front, the battle of the German border was going well. U.S. 1st Army troops captured the ruined German factory town of Stolberg, 6½ miles east of Aachen, after one of the bitterest house-to-house fights of the campaign.
On the U.S. 3rd Army front to the south, Lt. Gen. George S. Patton’s tanks and tank destroyers inflicted a smashing defeat on a powerful German armored force that attempted to throw them back from the Meurthe River line.
United Press writer Robert Richards reported that the Nazis broke off the battle this morning after losing at least 60 tanks in the past 24 hours, running their losses well above 320 panzers for the last 10 days.
But the Allies’ main bid for a swift and decisive breakthrough into Germany was being made on the Dutch lowlands at Arnhem, and the fate of the entire offensive rested momentarily on the courage of the dwindling band of paratroops north of the Rhine and the British tank men on the south bank.
United Press writer Ronald Clark said exceptionally fierce fighting was in progress in the Arnhem area this morning as the encircled paratroops beat off repeated German tank and infantry attacks.
Nazis battle hard
The Nazis were throwing everything they had in the way of men, tanks and guns into an all-out attempt to wipe out the sky troops before the relief column could break through.
The first rescuing tanks and armored troop carriers reached the Rhine about 5:00 p.m. Friday evening and a pooled dispatch from a correspondent with the main force in Arnhem said they linked up with an outpost of the airborne detachment and began shelling targets designated by the airborne commander.
The critical question was whether the British could take the Arnhem bridge intact – the airborne troops were believed holding the north side of the span and the Germans the south end – or would have to make an assault crossing of the Rhine under enemy fire.
Bridge intact
All accounts reaching headquarters this morning indicated the bridge was intact, although the possibility remained that the Germans might blow it up before retiring.
Savage fighting still raged along the flanks of the Allied spearhead thrusting up from the Belgian border to Arnhem, and one strong German force threw a flying wedge across the corridor late yesterday, threatening the head of the British 2nd Army’s armored thrust.
The enemy attack smashed across the main Eindhoven–Nijmegen highway between Veghel and Uden, about 13 miles north of Eindhoven.
British troops immediately countered the flanking blow but latest reports said the situation was confused.
Battle at Elst
A violent battle was also in progress at Elst where the Germans, after being thrown out of Nijmegen, set up a bristling block of tanks and artillery to prevent the Allies from getting reinforcements through to Arnhem.
British Tommies straddling the turrets of their tanks and crouching in armored troop carriers burst through the Nazi screen and infantrymen followed up to hold open the gap for an additional flow of reinforcements.
German artillery commanded the highway north of Elst, laying down a murderous crossfire on the British armor all the way to the Rhine.
Clouds hamper aid
Low-hanging clouds and mist continued to hamper the Allied effort, making it all but impossible to ferry in supplies to the beleaguered column at Arnhem or to throw any strong aerial force against the Nazi blockade.
More than 100 miles to the south, the U.S. 1st Army hammered out an important victory inside the Siegfried Line beyond Aachen, wiping out the last organized German resistance in Stolberg, which the enemy had converted into a “little Cassino” of fortified homes and barricaded streets.
The desperate German defense of the town was attributed to their anxiety to remove an aircraft parts factory. Nazi engineers were spotted dismantling the plant, but there was no immediate indication that they had succeeded in getting its equipment out.
Repel Nazis
Elsewhere along the border there was little change in the opposing battle lines as far south as the Lunéville–Château-Salins area east of Nancy, where Gen. Patton’s 3rd Army veterans sent the Germans reeling back toward their Siegfried Line after giving them probably the worst armored beating since D-Day.
A dispatch from Mr. Richards said the Battle of the Moselle was rapidly becoming the battle of the Seille as the Germans took advantage of rain and mud to dig in all along the latter, tiny river, which lies five miles east of the Moselle, from above Metz to Momeny.
The Allied headquarters communiqué confirmed front reports that U.S. 1st Army troops had been forced to give ground in the area east of Diekirch. Field dispatches said the Americans withdrew to the Our River line in that sector, indicating they had been driven back across the German border into Luxembourg.
Armies link up
On the southern flank of the 3rd Army line, Gen. Patton’s troops linked up with U.S. 7th Army forces south of Épinal and forced crossings of the Moselle at many points against stiffened resistance.
Other 7th Army units won small gains in a battle arc looping barely 10 miles from Belfort, on the historic southwestern invasion route to Germany.
Along the French Channel coast, Canadian troops cleared the last Germans from Boulogne, rounding up some 7,300 prisoners and establishing Britain’s first direct supply line across the Strait of Dover since 1940.
