BY MAGIC CARPET OVER EUROPE

Chronicle (Levin), 29 July 1946, Page 4

BY MAGIC CARPET OVER EUROPE

* Fantastic Experience of "Chronicle" Managing-Director

Writing from Eindhoven, Holland, on July 5, Mr. R. H. Billens, managing-director of "The Chronicle," states:— "This trip is too fantastic for words, and becomes mqre fantastic each day. Since Monday we have been in four countries — England, France, Belgium and Holland — and to-morrow we shall be in Germany. Each place is so different from the other that the swift transition is like a series of dreams — the last one becomes unreal as the new one takes its' place. The pace becomes hotter as we proceed and our day lasts (if we are lucky) from 7 a.m. until midnight, and occasionally until two in the morning. End of Hitler's Normandy Army "We left the airport near Caen in Normandy on Wednesday after another exhausting dajr visiting the battlelields. But the last day was the most thrilling of all, for we stood in the Falaise Gap and heard the story of the end of Hitler's great Normandy army which was trapped and annihilated almost to a man.

There are piles of wrecked trucks Lying in the fields, the only remaining evidence of the terrible slaughter and destruction — one of the most terrible in the whole history of warfare. After travelling over 200 milee in buses through the wreckage of bombing on cities and villages, we boarded our planes and in less tha'n two hours dropped on the Brussels airport and motored to the Palace Hotel. Here we were entertained at an amazing dinner by the British Ambassador, Sir Hugh Knatchball Hugesson, the guests 'including many notable Belgians. We had the Minister of War, the Chief of Btafl of the Belgian Army (who sat on my right), the head of the Belgian Railways (who sat on my left), the Lord Mayor or Burgomaster of Brussels and other notables. The burgomaster was imprisoned by the Germans for the whole period of the war and was to liave been shot two days after the AJJies entered the capital. The Railways chief was the head of the Belgian resistanee movement. AVe got on excellently together and he oft'ered to provide a free railear for a day's programme to visit the historic spots of Belgium if I could arrange for 20 others Lo join in. But, alas! We had to move on. We started dinner at 9 p.m. and finished some time after midnight. Then some of us roamed out to get some fresh ail- as it was stiflingly hot, and landed in a night club. We were not/ impressed as it was so obviouhly false and not very well done, although it »vas Brussels' leading show.

A Glimpse of the Shops "We had a free mbrning — the first of the tour — and everyone dashed for the shof]Ds to spend something — our first opportunity. Some of us arrived at the Bon Marehe, a colossal store which makes Selfridges in London loolc small. We had a lot of fun trying to make the girls understand us. We tried to lind some Brussels or Bruges laee, bu after hunting for over an hour without any luck, we had to race back to catch our bus. We bussed to the airport^and then set sail over Holland. "For nearly two hours we cireled round the historic scenes of the battle for Antwerp, especially the island" of Waleheren which, as the airmen say, was "sunk" (inundated by breaking the dylces) to drown the Hun out andj open the way to Antwerp 's port. The island is slowly recovering, but there; are still large tracts of land not yetj back in production. Then we made' straight for Eindhoven. We expected^ to find a town about the size of Masterton, but instead we found a modern Dutch city of over 100,000 people. Here are the headquarters of Philips' radioj. a .fgctoTy . empl ovin^:22,01)0/ ban(l«-.

Heroic Landiri^ Wja^f,a31ed^^;.| "I am very xmich in love with Hol-; land," Mr. Billens continued. "Fromi the air it is incredibly flat, cultivated to the last inch, ordered and tidy even to the smallest village. "We spent two nights here and today rode nearly 250 miles in buses over very bumpv roads. It would be impossible to describe it all; sufficient to say we visited Arnheim, the scene of the heroic airborne landing which failed. i This must have been a lovely old Duteh | ••ity, near the German border, and part of it — the liomes of the wealthy, retired Dutch East Tndies planters — lies on the onty high ground in Holland, risingj from the river in a terrace ' witli Iovelv trees in the midst of which are, some of the most beautiful liomes in) Holland. The city was devastated by j the fighting and we heard the stories of this heroic failure from the men who led the attaclcs. "Then we were driven t about 70 niiles to Utrecht, oue of the choicest cities in Holland, just to pass through the glorious eountryside with spic and j span towns and villages and beautiful ( liomes lining the route. We only staved' about three-quarters of an liour; then set off for Eindhoven, p,rriving at S p.m. j We start early to-morrow for Germany. and my next bedroom will be in the Officers' Club at Ivrefeld. So that isi the way this lightning tour — the.magic! earpet — is working. These are very! scrappy notes but are the hest way, Ij feel, to record the unrecordable. "

Visit to Germany BERLIN, July 7. "It surely'must have been years, not weeks ago, I had a ten-minute talk with His Majesty, King George. England, France, Holland, Belgium aucl Germany all in seven days! We arrived at 7.30 p.m. by air and these two days again have been so fantastic we might just. as well have been making a journey to the moon, for perliaps nowhere on earth could one see the sights we have been seeing. An early Saturday breakfast saw us gatliered in the lounge at Eindhoven where we were ' brief ed ' as usual ' by Brigadier Belchem, the 35-year-old right-hand man of 'Monty,' who' has been doing. that job right through the tour. He is the coming man in the British Army, liandsome, ga y, very friendly and a master at explaining the intrieate details of an operation. Then off we went on one of the most exhausting motor touijs we have yet experienced — the crossing of the Rhinc. We followed the traek of the great advancing armies and were soon on German soil.

"Blasted and ruined towns went by so quickly we could hardly keep track of them. Then we reached the scene of the first crossing on peaceful looking, open countryside, every inch of which was under intensive cultivation. We sat near the banks of the historic river among crops and orchards while officers told their story from the loud-speaker car which is one united in onr three-quarter-mile-long cavalcade which has heen racing at 40 miles an hour through the villages and cities of four centres, while the inhahitants stare openmouthed at us. "We are 24 buses in all and, in addition, there are six officers' ears, a food bus, sometimes a baggage bus, a couple of jeeps and two motor-cycles carrying military police who whizz up and down our lines at about 60 miles an .hour. And don't they get a kick out of it, directing us at the crossroads, holding up trains to allow the new British Empire army of occupation to pass. However, back to the Rliine! "After the story was told we lunched on this old world spot surrounded by about 20 to 30 skinny and ragged boys and girls who watched hungrily as our food rapidly disappeared. They all looked hadly undernoiu'ished and grabhed everything we had left over, which was, fortunately, quite a lot. All sorts of animals were wandering ahout, the quaint'est being a couple of skinny ewes in milk which were tethered just helow /the loud-speaker and persisted in adding their raucous baas to the military oratory. The people hereabouts apparently keep a couple to supply milk for the tahle. "We then followed the course of the battle at other points and fmally turned south, running parallel with the Rliine, through lovely country cultivated to the last inch with crops of all hinds. We passed numerous villages which only showed the ravages of war where the German .units held up the advance by using strategie crossroads for defence. Our objective was Ivrefeld, about 80 miles south of Eindhoven, a city of 150,000 people tuni at one time apparently a very beautiful old world German eentre. As . we entered the suburbs, cleaned, orderly and gav with flowers, here was almost the first good garden we had seen since leaving New Zealand. There was no sigri of anything abnormal. Then, as we came to the business area, we were face to fa.ce witli a city of the dead — perhaps it would be better to say a dead city. Imagine the whole of the business and industrial area of Wellington city one vast waste of ruins and you will at least get some idea of the extent of this desert of bricks and mortar. I would say, at a conservative estimate, that the businesses, offices, hotels, etc., now functioning would not be greater than the business area of Levin, and n;ost of ■those/ffiping- business -ar.e (bperatin^ in 'partly- deniq]i|heR;%ij!4ing?- -It has cto rbe* seen" td.b6 llel|^?d^ 'j^l'here is an eerie beauty aboiit? tliese 'gaunt skeletons standing silffiiti'u.anj; tenantless against the evening sky, and I longed to be alone with my pastels for a day or two. All this waste and desolation is the result of two air raids.

Essen and Cologne "This morning we moved out into the Ruhr, the highlights of the tour being Essen, the home of the vast Ivrupps armament factories, in themselves nearly as large as the business area of Palmerston North, and Cologne, the Yv'orst-bombed city in the world. "It is useless to attempt a description of these appalling evidences of the might of the Allied air forces. Essen is a gigantic mass of twisted steel and rusting mechanical giants — Hitler's chief hoast and glory and his grave. Cologne is completely laid in ruins and will never rise again. It must have been a lovely city. Now you move through miles and miles of skeletons, once nohle buildings rising to ten and 20 storeys, 2he walls tottering dizzily above you as you pass, threatening. always to crash about you. The Cathedral still stands, but it has heen gutted by fire and is a dead sentinel brooding pathetically over a dead city. "Now on to Berlin, by air, and here we are in another abode of desolation, but we could only see it. in tbe fading liglit of evening, and to-morrow — or is it to-dajq for midnight has passed — we have a full programme amidst ruins."