SKY BOMBARDMENT.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 4, Issue 110, 19 November 1915, Page 4 (Supplement)

SKY BOMBARDMENT.

LONDON AIR RAID

WINDOWS TORN OUT OF HOSPITALS.

NEW YORK ARTISTS THRILLING STORY. (An account ol another Zeppelin raid on London was supplied to the New York "Evening I'ost" by a New \ork artist who is at present !u the English metropolis. According to the writer (Bolton Brown), the enemy did considerable damago within the environments of the city. This is of particular interest iu view ot the cable news published yesterday.)

Bolton Brown, tho well-known New York artist, member of the National Arts Club, sent the enclosed l account ot the recent Zeppelin raid on London, in a private lettoi. Mr. Brown has been occupying a London studio for tho past six months, where he has been doyoting himself very successfully to lithography. A group of unique artlithographe by him has been recently placed in the British Museum. Mr. Brown's account of the experience is the more vivid because it was written within un hour or so of the events which it describes (comments tho New York "Evening Post"). He was roused out of bed by the explosions, went forth to investigate, and wrote his letter before he went- back to bed. The letter confirms the other available information to the effect that tho damage done by the raiders was very much more serious than tho British official reports have acknowledged, and that such important institutions as the British Museum narrowly escaped destruction. "Well," says Mr. Brown in his letter, which is dated September 8, " we've had a sure-enougn Zeppelin raid ... it was an hour and a half ago—just about 11 p.m.— and I had been in bed just long enough to get warm and relaxed, when whang! came an unmistakable explosion, both loud and deep, and seeming not far from our immediate vicinity. I lay for a moment waiting to see what next, and then rose to see what a view out of my cast window would reveal. Just then whang! went another, and then at intervals of a few seconds a whole series of detonations —rather serious, and obviously each one was nc-irer than tho last.

HOW THE ZEPPELIN LOOKED. "Looking south-east, towards St Paul's Cathedral (perhaps onemiie and u-half oft), there a greit hery glow, and 1 knew it was a eonilagratiou set going by the bombs. Througu th<: haze- of this the searchlights were twinkling, and just aa. a tremeadtun and very near whang 1 came off, the guns began to bark, and 1 heard "Ik whine of some sort of projectile*, imd just about then, as 1 was 'rubbar.ng all 1 could to discover what was up in the sky, lo! and rigiit irom ove; the eaves, Hunted the clear white silhouette of a Zeppelin! The searchlights had got it, and made it, by their interna illumination look as white us if iv had been covered with phosphorus. "Many guns, some louder aud some smaller, kept banging away at it, aud little spark-like explosions twinkled all tliruiign the air in its general region, but 1 could uot see any that happened very near it. There was a humming and winning of things gong face through the air j but what they were, or which way they were going, 1 could not tell.

"1 was disappointed at not seeing any results on me old Zeppelin, wincn simply sa.ied slowly along, sidling and shining lor or less—evidently contending witu air currents. Little by little it worked oil to the north, and alter probably three or lour minutes it was not bo plain, and the searchlights revealed obscuring wreaths and flakes ot vapour between tlieni and the ship. Whether these were natural clouds or smoko from our bombs —or some defensive and euttlchshish device df the enemy, 1 could not be sure.