SPIRIT UNBROKEN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24408, 20 September 1940, Page 5

SPIRIT UNBROKEN

THE PEOPLE OF LONDON PROUD AND DEFIANT NAZI AIMS FRUSTRATED (United Press Association) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright)

LONDON, Sept. 18,

Neutral military attache and correspondents who have experienced bombings in Warsaw Barcelona, and Madrid, agree that London lias already taken more punishment than any city, not excluding Rotterdam. They express the opinion that the Luftwaffe has failed to achieve the main purpose of the raids, because the bombs have not disorganised London’s communications, thus supplies and reinforcements are still able to be sent to areas which the Germans planned to invade. The seventh mr raid warning in London to-day, and, incidentally, the hundredth since the outbreak of war, was given at 5.58 p.m Three hundred raiders crossed the south-east coast in an endless stream for 15 minutes during the afternoon. Eight fighters escorted each bomber. The gale has dropped over the Straits of Dover but a big sea is still- running The sirens sounded for the eighth time at 7.58 p.m. Night raiders’ bombs hit the Lambeth Walk market and three wellknown Oxford street stores—namely, John Lewis, Bourne and Hollingsworth, and D. H. Evans. Hundreds of people sheltering under the stores were unhurt. Bomb in Graveyard One large bomb uprooted the trees 'and tombstones in a central graveyard. Five bombs falling on a building adjoining the Bank of New South Wales set fire to the bank, but the fire was extinguished after the premises had been damaged h: r fire and water. An incendiary bomb slightly damaged the Spanish Embassy. During the third warning of the morning the roar of battle was heard over the Thames Estuary. Numerous high explosives considerably darpaged one estuary town, with eight casualties. A Junkers plane shot down by anti-aircraft guns at Maidstone last night crashed into two houses, the four members of the crew and one elderly invalid being killed. An incendiary bomb damaged the great hall at Eltham Palace, a famous historic fragment dating back six centuries and a-half. Firemen saved the buildings from destruction, which would have wiped out the last vestige of the palace where Henry VIII was educated and Edward 111 held his Parliament. An anti-aircraft shell fell on the lawn of Westminster Abbey to-day, but did not explode. A time bomb fell near the American Embassy buildings. It did no damage. ,-, „ . After 17 hours of rescue efforts an injured man was released from a car in which he was trapped in the basement of a West End garage. His wife had been killed nearby. Eight .members of the Auxiliary Fire Service were killed in the same garage by a bomb.