SUCCESSES NORTH OF LAKE LADOGA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 27 December 1939, Page 5

SUCCESSES NORTH OF LAKE LADOGA

Threat to Vital Railway Link HUNDREDS OF SOVIET PLANES DISTURB CHRISTMAS DAY SOME DROP BOMBS AND OTHERS LEAFLETS (By Telegraph.—Press Association.—Copyright.) HELSINKI, December 26. Hundreds of Russian pianos flow over Finland throughout yesterday, some of them dropping bombs and others leaflets. The main objects, apparently, were to disturb the Finnish observance of Christmas Day. Three enemy planes wore shot down near Viborg where, it was officially announced yesterday, Finnish troops were fighting on Russian soil lor the first time since the invasion. The Russians have been driven back across their own frontier at East Leiska, north of Lake Ladoga. Russian planes repeatedly bombed Viborg, but only several were wounded. The casualties wotdd have been high but the population has been practically wholly evacuated. Buildings were demolished, but there was no damage of military importance. A Russian “Big Bertha ’’ shelled the city from a distance of 25 miles. According to a Daventry broadcast, the Finns are within 120 miles of the Leningrad-Murmansk railway and if the Finns are able to reach this railway they will sever the Russians main line of communication to the north and cut oil supplies to the Russian forces operating in the Arctic area. It is reported that a Russian patrol of eight men has been found frozen to death.