GUNS MAKE BREACH

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 240, 29 September 1939, Page 3

GUNS MAKE BREACH

HOLE BLASTED IN WEST WALL > POSITIONS ANNIHILATED ' GERMAN ATTACK ON WING LONDON, Sept. 27. The* Paris correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain says that French artillery is reported to Rave blasted a hole in the Siegfried Line between Alerzig and Saarbrucken Despatches from the front say that the German counterfire against the French advance positions in the Saar and Palatinate regions is apparently designed to -protect the feverish attempts to rebuild the shattered blockhqifscs behind tho German lines.

The .morning despatches report thfft the French annihilated important positions between Alerzig and Saarbrucken in an area where there are between 30 and -I0 pill-boxes to the square mile This confirms the report “that the French aro subjecting the Siegfried Line to Tv terrific onslaught. With the whole front line from Luxemburg to the Swiss frontier ablaze with gun-fire it is stated that the Germans concentrated the latest attack on the extreme eastern wing under cover of guns near Wissombourg. 'I his apparently was designed to reach the flank of the French forces in the Vosges forest west of Wissembourg, where the old German forest is reported to have been cut off from the main fortifications protecting the J’irmasensLaiuPau road. The French are steadily consolidating their positions elsewhere.

The official French communique merely stated: “Tlu* night was quiet. There was enemy artillery fire in the rear of our lines in the region -south of Wissombourg.” A later official announcement stated that 'German longrange guns pounded the French rear lines methodically to-day. A illages and road communications on a 50-mile front between Saarbrucken and AA isseinlining were swept by Nazi batteries which were 20 miles distant.

GERMAN AIR SORTIE COMPLETE FAILURE* CAPITAL SHIPS ATTACKED NAZIS ... LOSIS TWO .BOMBERS ]TIN DUN . Sept. 27. ' It n;as officially announced in Berlin to-day that German planes attacked a British fleet in the N< rth Sea, destroyed an aircraft carrier and damaged one battleship. These* claims were denied by the British Admiralty. 'Hie First- Lord; Air. AA’inston Chui'chhill, in the House of Commons, said that 20 German aircraft attacked a British naval squadron in the middle of tin* North Sea. No British ship was hit and there wore no casualties on the British side. One German flying heat was shot down, another was damaged, and. a third flying boat- was captured after a forced landing. j Air. -Ohm-chill’s statement was in j reply to a question, and the tacts quoted were from a report as wirelessed by the C'omiiumder-in-Cliief of the Home* Fleet. * | The British squadron comprised British capital ships, an aircraft carrier, cruisers, and destroyers. The Berlin High Command later explained: “An aircraft carrier was hit by a heavy bomb,” adding: “I hat did' not mean it was sunk. (Continued at foot previous column.)