The Philadelphia Inquirer from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 2

a THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER. SATURDAY MORNING. JUNE 10. 1944 Published Dally and Sunday. Entered as aefond-clss matter the Postoffice in Philadelpfi pnia.

under act oT March 3. 1879. Peter titan's D-D a if Log Fecamp Invasion Raid on France Brings Thrill a Minute By Ivan H. (Cy) Peterman Inquirer War Correspondent (By Wireless) Copyright 1944, The Philadelphia Inquirer NINTH AIR FORCE BOMBERS BASE, June 6 (Delayed) HE motors throb in the darkness, and their vibrations run through the metal wings of the freshly painted bomber. It is 'M-l JM Seine Bay (J' i fxpggk bees rras 1J- MILES I rw-, I fW -f Yank Troops Slash Nazi Cherbourg Lines By JAMES M.

LONG Continued From First Page another mile beyond St'e. Mere Eglise, which is 18 miles southeast of Cherbourg, and intimated that the weak secondary roads left to the Nazis in the peninsula were already threatened if not broken by Allied parachutists who, the enemy said, were operating on the other side of the peninsula near Lessay, bottleneck of the westcoast road and a small spur railway. The Americans, commanded by Lieutenant General Omar Bradley, who himself was in the field, also made gains on the southeast flank of their 28-mile stretch of beachhead by capturing Formigny, midway east between St. Mere Eglise and Bayeux. ALLIES HOLD VITAL HILL West and southwest of Bayeux the Allies held onto an important hill and poured their armor into a fight that may prove to be the key to the tank battleground between Bayeux and Caen.

The fiercest fighting of the whole invasion swirled around Caen, nine miles inland from the bay of the Seine, where at least two German panzer divisions were trying hold that strong point and win maneuverable control of the good tank fighting zone to the west. 1 x. tjv wt mT The headquarters communique made clear tnat tne also were getting their heavy armor into action and that The weight of armor on both sides a HENNEBON PENMAPOH LO0(N- 9 tLOlQMil RENNES S. A The Odds Were 58 WHERE AMERICANS ARE BATTLING American airborne troops and infantry have cap- tured Ste. Mere Eglise on the Cherbourg peninsula and have cut the main roads and rail line leading to the great port.

Other U. S. forces are fanning out southwest of Bayeux, while British and Canadian troops are still bat- tling for Caen. Among other towns that have fallen to WITHIN 17 MILES OF CHERBOURG the Allies are Formigmy, Berniers-sur-Mer, Courseulles- sur-Mer, St. Aubin-sur-Mer, Lion-sur-Mer and Luc-Oui- streham.

The inset map shows location of a naval battle (A) in which Allied destroyers blew up one Nazi de- stroyer, ran another aground and damaged two more off Ushant Island yesterday. Trio of US. Paratroopers Get Half a Hundred Nazis By Howard Cowan A U. S. NINTH AIR FORCE TROOP CARRIER BASE, June 9 (A.

GLIDER pilots returning to this base today reported that Lieutenant Robert Campbell, of Seattle, and two parachute troopers wiped out 58 Germans with hand grenades and a ma concrete runway, where the crew the same. I fire a short burst from starboard, making sure not to point at a following bomber. And keeping clear also of those clustered vessels. Then the port gun gets a workout. It vibrates meanly in my hands, a nasty instrument if ever there was one.

Again Theobald points and Hobbs touches my back with his toe. Out there is the coast of France. At last we've seen it. I SEE bright flashes, and then my neck begins to prickle. Red trac ers go shooting past our plane.

I see two cruisers firing rapidly toward the shore and then four water spouts aa shells hit near one. The ship veers farther out to sea, keeps shooting. "We bomb at 6500 feet," the intercom interrupt. "In three minutes." We fly down the sandy coastline. Just over the water's edge.

The flak Is coming thick now, for we are approaching the target. The big red blobs split between us and the wing-man, and that, my good friends, is too close. I suddenly seize an extra helmet and sit upon it. I wish to God those bombs were gone. Somehow I try to pull my head down into the flak suit, knowing full well that it's not much protection, that a fragment of shell goes through as if it were paper.

I stare down first right and then left, and Just then two boats go up in explosions. Apparently they must hav hit mine, but they're well beyond our approaching armada. GERMAN E-boats are fixing at us now near shore. Puffs of black shell smoke hang farther back. I do not see it, but one puts an Incendiary into a bomber, sets it on fire.

Three of the boys ball into the water. The pilot tries to get his bombs to the target. He struggles with the crippled airplane, then in a flash it blows to pieces. The fire has ignited the bombload. That 1 the only loan our group has.

Now inland about half a mile there is a terrible commotion. A patch of hellish, smok and fire bubbles skyward. Flak bursts all around, but I pay no attention. Over the phone comes the call: "Bombs away!" We ar approaching that battery of Nad guns. They look like a series of golf bunkers, neatly ranged like some sandy folly on the beach.

I see the racks suddenly empty, the bombs fall down. IMAGINE those gunners are on the lam. Well, they better be, for look at that. An awesome spectacle is spreading below. The bomb, carpeting the target, are bursting like the bubbles on a vat of nitric acid.

There are spouts of flame and belching smoke which seem to leap at us like some angry monster writhing horribly and trying to follow. It is terrible in sheer destruction and has me hanging out the window. The plane veers sharply inland now, and the formation foiinar swing over lovely fieids and flat land scape, green, purplish, brown. Many are covered with water, some are plowed but unseeded, all are deserted and empty. There are no Germans visible, although a column of tanks and trucks creeps to the south.

UNQUESTIONABLY this Is a tre- a aiiu JLX1S IH never forget or regret, now that it's completed. There they were, going back to Europe, Britishers burn ing with vengeance since Dunkirk- Frenchmen bound to retake their homeland. Czechs. Poles. Norse, all the beaten and humiliated sons of Nazifled Europe.

uown there In those shins wag ing for our bombs to fall to clear a way. Well, we dropped them, on the button, too. The 60O Marauders did Just that and did It well. We are levelling over the field. Then the wheels touched on the runway, the ground crew came running towards us, there was babbling all around, and D-Dav wm hutory for those of the first Marauder mis sion.

Yesterday's Local Weather Kcyert Philadelphia, June 9. 1944 3 si 8.30 A. P. P. M.

M. M. 61 SO 71 79 31 37 6 5 11 lear Cloudy Clear incnesi temperature (3.15 Highest temperature this date last 73 years Lowest temperature (5 A Lowest temperature thi date last 73 yenra 1H13 Average temiwrarure trxlav Aver, temperature this date last year Normal for this date Kxi-ess since June 1st J.xcess. since Jan 1 Total precipitation since June 1 S2 33 47 3 233 T. 17.31 loiai precipitation since Jan 1 Deficiency since Jan 1 07 Hourly Temperatures From Thermograph Trace HI fin Weather Bureau Bulletin General Weather conditions at 8 "10 TEMPERATURE lidnieTit 1 A.

M. fin ip. m. Ta 3 A. 57 3 Ml 4 A.

M. 4 P. si 5 A. 55 5 Ml 6 A. M.

55 6 p. M. 7 A. M. 58 7 P.

-4 8 A. M. 61 p. If) A. M.

70 9 P. M. 11 A. M. 74 30 P.

M. 11 P. M. u. murky and miserable on the shuffles in and out, avoiding the churning propellers as they re-check every detail before takeoff.

This scene is repeated at half a hundred dispersal points, at each of which 56 B-26's are standing at their blocks, awaiting this mission. I pull back a sleeve and look at my watch. It's 3.30 o'clock on this raw but momentous morning. Half an hour to takeoff. I HAVE everything but a' flak suit, and the colonel insists I wear one.

He sends a soldier running. "You don't want to ride back there without some protection," the colonel says. The man returns with the flak suit measures it to my back and chest, tosses it through the waist window. "You don't put it on till we cross the coastline," the tail gunner explains. The bomb bay is full.

Sixteen bombs weighing 250 pounds each. Two tons of explosive with contact fuses. That means they go off when they hit. It's still dark as we taxi up the perimeter. It is two minutes after lour.

Take-ofr in 10 more minutes. I try to fmd a kneeling position in the waist and hurt my knees on the metal belly. THE Martin-built bomber bounces ftlnncr nnwr irihratlmr every rivet. We reach the runway and wheel to position. Six minutes after four.

The light in the bomb bay is extinguished. The top turret gunner is squeezing through and the tail gunner comes back from his position. They close one of the waist windows, but leave the other open. Eleven minutes after four. Captain Bill Brady, of 6309 Overbrook Philadelphia, a West Pointer flying one of these 56 airplanes, has instructed us in the use of a rubber dinghy.

Also in how to open the parachute. Likewise Captain Webster Allyn. Mt. Holyoke place, Swarthmore, who was wounded by flak that missed his spine by one inch. Yesterday he saw his airplane blow up on a forced landing when another crew started a mission.

He, too, will be going to France in a moment, flying another Silver Streaker. It is 4.12, and the engines snarl. The gunner, Jules Theobald, slams down the window. I brace my helmet against the top turret cylinder, which hangs down like a caisson between the waist guns and bomb bay. WE LIFT into the night and I can't Bee anything at all.

The plan is worked to the second; we cut out a pattern under Pilot Jens Norgaard's expert hand, with the crack young navigator calling positions. The navigator is Lieutenant Louis Offenberg from Maine, best in the group and maybe the whole command. Anyway, his duty this morning is to find those gun emplacements In this weather, setting the fashion for subsequent bomb patterns. The bomb Job is left to another quiet expert, James Parish, a cool young man from Montgomery, Ala. We are well up now and banking sharply.

I can see the lights of the field and watch the red flares go out our window. NOW I see the others climbing behind us, and two are almost touching wings to ours. We are flying in obscurity, barely able to distinguish one another, but making a tight formation. I grasp the barrels of the machine guns and stare horribly out of the small windows. In order to ball out of a Marauder, you must be quick and decisive, they told me.

First, pull the cotter pin in the machine gun mounting and toss it out the waist window. Then be sure the flak suit is off and dive after it. Pull the ripcord as you get clear of the airplane. I wonder, if yonder pilot comes any closer, if I'll have time to unfasten that window? THIS is the leadofT plane, and Lieutenant Colonel Bob Witty, the Clevelander with a liking for scribes, sports and good conversation, is directing the Marauders in. We're over the coast, and it's getting daylight now, and through the storm I now see the English Channel below.

Ken Hobbs, Denver's member of this crew, puts on my flak suit. This is a medieval contraption, strips of steel like a corset in canvas. It snaps over the shoulders and hangs like a sandwich sign back and front, protecting to the thighs. "Jerk this red strap to get it off." FIFTEEN minutes to six and heading for Europe. We fly now at 2000 feet, and the Isle of Wight lies directly below us.

So do hundreds of Allied ships, also moving into the Channel. They leave pretty white wakes, like a wedding gown train. Theobald signs for me to look to the left side where two ships appear to be fighting. We watch smoke puff from their sides. The planes, stepped neatly down behind us, the wingmen almost touching, so close do they hover, are beautiful now in the morning sunrise.

Those broad black and white put on yesterday afternoon, a last-minute identification, keep the Navy well aware of who we are. In the pink glow of morning there seem to be boats by the thousands. How many? Seven thousand, we hear later, enough to make Drake go back to his game of bowls were he to see it. THAT'S fine, so long as they're not German, and speaking of Nazis, where is the Luftwaffe? Above, about and below us are friendly fighters. Our fighters, British Spitfires, 2700 of them, the colonel said.

Never such air cover. But still, one never knows. I hear the tailgunner warm his weapons. He signals for me to do the Germans had not been able to outmatch it. It was disclosed that the Allies have taken 4000 to 5000 prisoners since the invasion began.

MOST SUCCESSFUL It was announced by the Allies that American parachute troops who landed on D-Day near Ste. Mere Eglise had carried out the most successful airborne operation In history. Borne French parachutists went along as guides. The Americans, having linked up their airborne and ground troops, were fanning out in two directions from the center or their beachhead near Carentan at the neck of the peninsula, and had taken more than 800 prisoners. ON 60-MILE AREA Place names remained scarce in the news from the sprawling beachheads, which now extended over 60 miles, from just east of Caen to the vicinity of Ste.

Mere Eglise in depths varying from a mile or so to more than ten. The Germans conceded that one beachhead waa nine miles deep along the Orne River to Caen and that a wedge had been driven through Bayeux and five miles on southwest towards St. Lo a depth of 10 miles. TANK BATTLE AT CAEN Supreme Allied Headquarters said the main German counter-attack in the Caen area was held and ground was gained by the Allies. The Germans said a tank battle at Caen was raging towards a climax.

Today Lily John M. MoCuIloiitfliJ Continued From First Page strategic reserves against the main beachhead. Tf that PTpnf. nnnnfraTtflr for which both Montgomery and Rommel are preparing with feverish zeal, fails, then Cherbourg's garrison will be condemned to as bitter and hopeless a suicide stand as von Paulus Sixth Army in front of Stalingrad. But neither the beachhead nor Cherbourg is the sole worry of the German High Command and its astute general staff.

Hitler's Europe is a continent beset. Neither he nor his erals, as one observer remarked, "knows where the next punch is coming from or who is going to throw it." Hitler, who felt that he had ensured a one-front war in June. 1940, who pledged the German people that he would not commit the fatal error of being drawn into a two-front war as was Imperial Germany three decades ago. now finds himself encircled near and far in a multi-front threat. The threats: IThe Allied invasion of the Norman coast in great force, backed by greater force.

The Allies bombed into rubble the myth of an impregnable Atlantic Wall. 2 The Allied successes in Italy, where the 10th German Army, scrambling wildly up the Tyrrhenian coast in retreat, seems on the verge of rout and where German resistance appears to be deteriorating rapidly. 3 The threat of further Allied moves, heightened by Supreme Allied Headquarters' warning to the fishermen from France to North Cape to get off the sea for the period from mid-afternoon yesterday until next Thursday. 4 The sustained and awe- inspiring blows of the Allied aerial fleets from British, Italian and Russian bases. The imminent threat of a powerful Red Army offensive, whose most to be feared move would be a drive east of the Carpathian passes into Hungary, coupled with a sledge-hammer blow through the Carpathian passes onto the plains of Hungary.

6 The evident rise of the French underground, ad mitted by the Nazis themselves today through indications of serious uprising by partisans along the Seine from Paris to Le Havre, centering on Rouen and at Lyons, vital communications and rail center on the main rail line from Marseilles to Paris. Never in his career has Hitler needed his intuition so badly end seldom has it appeared so inadequate for its taslc was increasing at numerous points, and field dispatches from Allied correspondents said the assembling of German tanks and infantry foreshadowed strong new attacks against the Allies in the early future. DEFEAT NAZI ARMOR Near the east flank of the Allied front, the Canadians fought off German tank attacks over open sights at 200 yards in an armored battle described as the largest yet fought Since the invasion began Tuesday. The British and Canadians were disclosed to have landed originally in the region of Berniers-sur-Mer, 10 miles west of the Orne River mouth, and to have quickly captured Ber-niers. Field dispatches yesterday said the Britsh and Canadians had Joined in the drive on Caen.

The Canadian Third Division was one of those in action. OTHER VILLAGES TAKEN It was announced that besides Berniers, coastal villages taken by the Canadians and British the first day included Courseulles-sur-Mer, St. Aubin-sur-Mer, Lion-aur-Mer, Luc Ouistreham and Hangrune. As the Allied beachheads slowly merged and took shape as a con tinuous front, the weather grew worse and was described as almost as great an enemy as the German troops. Winds, waves, clouds and rain have interf erred with the operations since the first troops stepped onto the beaches Tuesday.

On Wednesday the Channel was so rough that unloading had to be halted for a time. It improved somewhat Thursday, and the convoys began to make up for lost time, but by Friday conditions had become worse, with gusty wind, fog and mist that at times cut visibility to a halfcmlle. MASS SEASICKNESS D-Day itself was described by one naval officer as "one of the greatest cases of mass seasickness in the history of the world." In spite of the weather, the Allies made it clear they had been able to put ashore at least enough men, tanks and guns to balance anything the Germans thus far have moved up, but conditions were such that there was not a single report of air activity Friday in direct support of the invasion. The Allies thus were weakened in the two departments in which thej have overwhelming superiority sea and air but nevertheless were declared officially to be progressing steadily. EXPECT NEW INVASION The Oermans contend that despite the weather the Allies already had put their third assault wave ashore and had other air borne divisions in northeast England and Scotland to support an amphibious attack which the Nazis said they expected to come between Dunkirk and Ostend in the next few days.

Numerous villages, most of them not disclosed by name, have been taken in the Allied drives, and Allied correspondents at the front general ly agreed that the position in Normandy was being strengthened steadily. The German radio in another of its frequent propaganda broadcasts, contended the Allies had "only nibbled a small piece out of the Atlantic Wall" and had "not managed to synchronize the fighting from Bayeux inland with that of the Americans on the Cherbourg peninsula." Invasion Prisoners Reach England SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND, June 9 (A. The first enemy prisoners taken in the western inva sion and brought to this marshaling area arrived today. There were over 1000, of which about 100 were casualties. A total of about 1100 will be lodged in a prison camp already set up.

Arriving also are several hundred walking wounded American soldiers. Pronunciation Of War Names 4 By Associated Press FRENCH Bretteville Brtt-VEiL Oranvilte Orahn-VEFX St. Martin-de-Varrevllle Sehn Mahr-tahn'-der-vahr-VEEL Trevieres Traiv-YAIR" Bernieres Bairn-YAIR Houlgate Hool-GAT Mezidon May-zee-DOHN ITALIAN Ivanoe Bonomi Ee-vah-NOH-ay Boh-NOH'-mee Vejano Vay-YAII'-noh Allamiege Ah-lahm-YAY'-ray Magliano Mahl-YAH'-noh Pescocostanzo PESS'-koh-koh- STAHN'-zoh STATUTE MILES R.A.F. Again Aids Invasion Forces By GLADWIN HILL Continued From First Page into the Munich area for the first time, and their escorting Lightnings, Mustangs and Thunderbolts fought through swarms of German fighters. Swiss dispatches said explosives were dropped in the Munich and Augsburg sectors.

Other United States heavy bomb er formations attacked Porto Marghera near Venice, and fighter bombers pounded German columns retreating above Rome. Thursday night several hundred R. A. F. heavy bombers flew through thick clouds and rain and laid explosives across the switching yards and Junctions at Rennes, Fougeres, Alencon, Mayenne and Pontaubault, at a cost of two aircraft.

BELOW INVASION COAST All these targets, including Rennes, 105 miles south of Cherbourg, are below the Normandy invasion coast, and the attacks were aimed at severing the main communication and reinforcement lanes between Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's armies in Normandy and those under Field Marshal Johannes Blaskowitz in southern France. AIM TO CUT OFF NORMANDY The assault in the area of Munich, a transport center for shuttling troops both from Germany toward Italy and also from the Eastern Front to the west, suggested methodical Allied aims of sealing off the Normandy front from Germany's "strategic reserve" areas elsewhere. Allied light bombers also struck at rail targets behind the Normandy battle lines during the night after heavy bombers and planes of all types had made similar supporting raids during Thursday. In the 24 hours ending at 11 A. M.

Friday at least 52 German planes had been destroyed in the air and 20 others on the ground. Allied losses were 35 fighters and five bombers. Marshall, King, Arnold in London By WILLIAM C. MURPHY, JR. Continued From First Page instantaneous decisions at the very highest military levels.

It was pointed out in this connection that by meeting in London the nerve center of the gigantic military machine now moving into Adolf Hitler's continent the Allied war chiefs would have all pertinent information instantly available to them. There also was the consideration that London probably offers better facilities than Washington for consultations between the Anglo-American staffs and the military representatives of Russia and of United Nations governments in exile. Also, it was not overlooked that General Charles de Gaulle, leader of the French Committee of National Liberation, now is in London, which might facilitate discussions concerning the part to be played by French forces after the Allied beachheads in France have been expanded. Gliders Carry Medical Aid SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE. June 9 (U.

The Allied Expeditionary Air Force has made 100 flights daily since D-Day, taking medical equipment by glider and parachute to Allied Armies, it was disclosed today. Four-foot long parachute canisters, with 350-pound capacity, have been dropped by the hundreds with rolls, bandages, surgical scissors, splints, gloves, masks and ether. Special canisters containing blood plasma have been flown in by gliders. to 3 Flight Officer Charles Dobeneck, of Jeannette, when they saw four Germans coming up the road. "VV aoT down behind a fence and drew a bead on them," he said.

"Then we saw a couple of O.I.'s behind them. One was tired and had an unloaded Garand, and he was making a German carry it." Lieutenant Lambert Wilder, of Bogota. N. who landed behind the beachhead about 7 o'clock Wednesday morning, found a Nazi mortar 15 feet from his craft. He and 13 air-borne troops scrambled to cover, set up their own guns, and swapped fire with the Germans, while the crews of two crashed gliders reached safety.

Germans Fear Belgium Invasion Continued From First Tage Allied beachheads were being narrowed by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's counter blows, Nazi broadcasters today conceded the main bridgehead had been widened. They acknowledged three Allied advances inland a five-mile wedge driven southwest of Bayeux toward St. Lo; a six-mile advance west of Bayeux "where spearheads of German counter-attackers now stand," and an advance of over a mile by Americans from fallen Ste. Mere Eglise toward Valognes on the road to Cherbourg. Tonight the Paris radio said that Coutances, on the west coast of the Cherbourg peninsula, had been "violently shelled" by British naval units.

The German news agency, D. N. said all three beachheads which the Germans admit the Allies hold were reinforced from the sea last night. These are the main one west of the Orne mouth and two smaller ones near Fort En Bessin and Quine-ville, farther west on the coast. previously had been reported off Ushant by coastal aircraft.

THE enemy was sighted, and our ships turned toward them, avoiding their torpedoes. In the course of the action, at times conducted at point blank range, H. M. S. Tartar passed through the enemy lines.

One enemy destroyer was torpedoed and blew up. A second was driven ashore in flames. Two others escaped after receiving damage by gunfire. H. M.

S. Tartar sustained some damage and a few casualties, but continued in action and has returned safely to harbor. Unsuccessful attempts were again made after dawn by E-boats to enter the assault area both from the east and west. They were intercepted and driven off by light coastal forces. Off Pointe de Barfleur in a short gun action, hits were observed on two of the enemy before they escaped.

During the night destroyers under the command of Rear Admiral Don Pardee Moon, U. S. intercepted a force of heavily-armed enemy craft between the mainland and the Isles de San Marcouf and drove them off. DURING the 24 hours of 08.00 (2 A. M.

E. W. this morning, 46 targets were engaged by Allied warships. Spotting for these shots was carried out both by aircraft and military forward observer officers who had been landed with the as sault troops. H.

M. S. Belfast (Captain R. H. Parham.

D. S. R. wearing the flag of Rear Admiral F. H.

G. Dal- rymple-Hamilton, C. B. and H. M.

S. Frobisher (Captain J. F. W. Mud- ford, R.

have done considerable execution on enemy concentrations. This morning H.M. S. Frobisher neutralized two enemy batteries and destroyed an ammunition dump. Secret Devices Aid Sky Troops SUPREME HEADQUARTERS AL LIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE, June 9 (A, American parachute troops dropping Into the Ste.

Mere Eglise sector of France Jselow Cherbourg carried out the most successful airborne operation in war history, it was disclosed today, and only about two percent of more than 1000 Royal Air Force and United States planes operating on D-Day were lost. New secret devices enabled para chute troops to land on designated places even through layers of clouds, a High Command report of the entire American-British air born invasion operation said. Other highlights of the operation were: Two hours after landing, some American parachute troops, were transporting themselves on captured German equipment. One glider landed on top of a house on the Valognes-Carentan road, and the troopers clambered down to capture sleeping Germans in their beds. Drops were made on a far larger scale than contemplated even by the Germans, and many times the numbers used by the Nazis at Crete were employed.

Both the Americans and British used gliders in daylight dW D-Day with small losses. The Germans had to give up using gliders in Crete because of severe losses. The Americans alone used 15 airdromes on D-Day. Pathfinders used by the R. A.

F. and U. S. air forces aided in the landings, and some parachute troops were on the ground, five hours before H-Hour. The Americans spent two years In planning the operation, and our troops trained with the British for many months.

Nazi Gars Reported Used by U. S. Unit LONDON. June 9 (A. A Berlin broadcast said tonight that American troops in Normandy were using German cars captured in Tunisia.

The report said the cars had been transported in gliders and were in use near Carentan. SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED EXPEDITIONARY FORCE, June 9 Communique No. 7 Early Morning. June 9 ALLIED troops have continued to make progress in all sectors despite further reinforcement of German armor. Landings have continued on all beaches, and bypassed strong points of enemy resistance are being steadily reduced.

During yesterday there was desultory firing from some coastal batteries, which were again silenced by gunfire from Allied warships. Allied aircraft continued to support naval and land forces yesterday by attacks on a variety of targets. Late in the day the weather over northern France caused a reduction in the scale of the air operations. Our heavy bombers, in strong force, attacked railway targets and air fields beyond the battle areas. Yesterday morning they were escorted by a medium force of fighters.

These and other fighters strafed ground targets, shooting down 31 enemy aircraft, and destroying more than a score on the ground. From these operations three bombers and 24 fighters are missing. MEDIUM bombers attacked a road bridge over the Seine at Vernon, and fighter bombers struck at troop transport concentrations, gun positions, armored vehicles, railway and road targets behind the battle line. Fighters patrolled over shipping and the assault area. Twenty-one enemy aircraft were destroyed.

Eleven of our fighters were lost, but two of the pilots are safe. chine-gun and captured a Nazi command post a mile and a half south of Ste. Mere Eglise, which now Is In American hands. Intelligence officers were piecing together the details and seeking to identify the two troopers. The gilder pilots, 27 of them, landed behind enemy lines in the first 48 hours of the invasion of Normandy.

Technically they were supposed to return immediately to base for more troops ana supply-carrying assignments, but they got caught up in the swirl of battle and fought beside the troops they had landed. TATIGUED and with bloodshot eyes and bearded faces, looking half comical in an assortment of captured Nazi regalia, they were full of stories of the awful price exacted from the Nazi hordes which Infested the nelds south of Ste. Mere Eglise and those dropped from the skies in a small-scale German parachute troop landing. Of 200 Nazi parachutists, 13 were taken prisoner. The others died at the hands of American parachutists who stood in the open firing and shouting defiance into the skies.

Flight Officer Robert (Red) David, of Indianapolis, and five parachutists commandeered a tank and roamed the woods, knocking out five pillboxes. ANOTHER, Robert Campbell, this one of Sierournev. was knocked flat by six machine-gun bullets as his glider landed, but he was unhurt. His flak suit saved him. Flight Officer Leo J.

Cordier, of East Hartford, and his crew untangled their Jeep from the wreckage of a glider and used it to carry the wounded to a first aid post a half mile away. They spent the night lying awake in foxholes as German snipers prowled about. The next day Officer Cordier said he was with Rocket-firing fighters attacked German E-boats in the leaving one in a sinking condition. Last night heavy bombers in force attacked railway centers at Rennes, Fougeres, Alencon, Mayenne and Pontaubault. Two heavy bombers are missing.

Light bombers struck at railway targets behind the battle area during the night. Communique No. 8 Evening, June 9 AMERICAN troops are across the Carentan-Valognes road in several places and have cut the broad gauge railroad to Cherbourg. Further gains have been made west and southwest of Bayeux. Fighting is severe in the area of Caen, where the enemy is making a determined effort to stem the advance.

The weight of armor on both sides is increasing, and heavy fighting continues in all areas. Enemy strongpoints previously bypassed now have been eliminated. The weather has deteriorated, but our beachheads are being steadily developed. Poor visibility and stormy weather reduced Allied air activity to a minimum over the battle area today. Before dawn this morning II.

M. S. Tartar (Commander B. Jones, D. S.

9. R. with H. M. S.

Ashanti (Lieutenant Commander J. R. Barnes, R. H. M.

Canadian ships Haida (Commander H. O. De Wolf, R. C. and Huron (Lieutenant Commander H.

S. Rayner, D. S. R. C.

O. R. P. Plyskawica, H. M.

S. Eskimo (Lieutenant Commander E. N. Sinclair, R. O.

R. P. Pior- un, and H. M. S.

Javelin (Lieu tenant Commander P. N. Lewis, D. S. R.

in company intercepted force of German destroyers which i IMI 73 Id 57 7'J 1H 49 75 10 .01 7H 82 10 57 H3 55 75 10 50 76 22 W) 69 16 68 52 lO 51 fl 6 64 84 6 81 S4 10 74 8 .32 59 80 22 55 82 11 54 S3 44 70 30 62 f4 3 73 90 f) 77 1 9 47 75 6 a Atlantic Cttv. N. J. Hoston. Mass.

Buffalo. N. V. Charleston. S.

C. Chicago. 111. Cleveland. O.

Denver. Col. Detroit. Mich. Duluth.

Minn. Harrisburg, Pa. Iiuisville. Ky. Miami.

Fla. New Orleans. La New York City Philadelphia, Pa. Pittsburgh. Pa.

Portland. Me. St. Louis. Mo.

Snn Antonio. Tex. Washineton. D. C.

Winnipeg. Man..