RUSSIAN DEFENCE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 20915, 15 October 1942, Page 5

RUSSIAN DEFENCE

AMERICAN TRIBUTE VIVID EXPERIENCES ACTIVITY ROUND RJEV (By Telegraph—Press Assn. —Copyright.) (Daily News Foreign Service— Copyright) (11.30 a.m.) CHICAGO, Oct. 13. Mr,. Leia-nd Stowe, in a dispatch from the Rjev 'front, says: “At last I have seen and lived with the Red Army in several sectors and have the feel o-£ these Russian soldiers and officers who have amazed the world. In the last nine days the Russian troops arid Russia’s battle have become vivid reality. We rode Ion” and hard and bounced high and interminably to get to the Rjev front. “Those who rode bounced with me. They were Ilya Ehrenburg, the Soviet’s 1 most famous war correspondent, Major Arapov, of the Red Star, and Captain Emma. Twice Russian peasants gave us shelter and with their magnificent hospitality and even their humble beds for the night. For seven days in the front sectors I saw a single male ‘ dressed in civilian clothes. Here such villages' as not completelv burned are inhabited only by women and children. Great; Fires Burning |j. “The thunder of howitzers and mortars and the thud 1 of bombs seldom cerise for more than an hour or two-'either day or night. . Here, within the rurnble of artillery; ; there is-also the peculiar* calm of men who ,kriow how to’command arid how to ;fight* ■- Wec 'see‘ grerit orange-* fires burning flight after night ini'thb city of Rjev : rind 1 machine-guns cackle and punctuate' ll the ci’is'jiv'i midnight air.. Cannon fire, exploding; mortars', and rockets trace a flickering pattern for miles along the front.” Mr. Stowe then describes 1 a rough journey ever 1 -shell-holes' through a 1 great wilderness and stretches where hundreds bf* Tanks and trucks gnashed and churned the earth. 'Captain Emma is chattering all the while.’-She does not seem to pay any attention',to bombs, ‘Syh'ereupon,” Miv Stowp says, “my opinion- of myself'takes a sharp drop. Transport l * soldiers working near the road take■; no 1 , notice either. Like Captain Emmarthey have been living in this atmosphere for a long time.”