SERVICES CONTINUE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 October 1940, Page 5

SERVICES CONTINUE

IN DAMAGED ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL.

(Received This Day, 9 a.m.) LONDON, October 11

Despite the damage to St. Paul’s Cathedral, weekday and Sunday services are not being interrupted. They are being held in Saint Faith’s Chapel crypt. A service was held ten hours after the bombing. There were forty persons, including the Cathedral’s A.R.P. workers, clergy, members of the Cathedral staff and their families sleeping in the crypt when the bomb fell. The Cathedral Treasurer, Canon Alexander, said: “My bed is almost undei- the altar. I thought the raid was over, when suddenly there was a great thump and the whole building shook tremendously. We rushed up, horrified with what we saw.” The surveyor’s preliminary report confirms that the cathedral’s fabric is not affected. Pieces of paper immediately stuck across suspicious cracks did not reveal deviations. AS IN OLDEN DAYS LONDON UNDAUNTED SPIRIT OF EMPLOYERS AND WORKERS. PRODUCTION PUSHED ON. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, October 10. The spirit of London during wanton attacks, not only on property but also—an action quite beyond the forgiveness of a true Londoner — on dearly-cherished public buildings forming part of its historic tradition was well shown by a luncheon of industrial merchants in a converted cloak-room-restaurant, where the kitchen had been bombed. The president of the London Chamber of Commerce, who presided, said: “As in the days when artillery first came, gaps are being made, but these gaps were always filled and they are being filled now by our own working people. We are not only ready and willing to' carry on export work; we are capable of doing it. One firm to my knowledge is doing six times the export trade now that it did before the war.” Merchants exchanged experiences, one telling how, on arriving in London one morning he was told that his office was in ruins, but in 48 hours he had got into touch with all his customers and carried out 99 per cent of orders. The Germans have frankly admitted that one of the objects of their raids on Britain is to break the civilians’ morale. In fact, however, workers throughout the country, in a spirit of defiance, disregard the bombs and push on with production. A correspondent who visited some of the heavily bombed areas of London today tells of one Thames-side works which had been bombed eight times in three weeks, but still mile after mile of highly specialised cable rolls off the machines to the ships berthed in the river. One worker said: “Every inch of this cable I regard as part of the noose we are putting around the Nazis’ necks, and I get no end of a kick out of it.” LOSSES ON THURSDAY EQUAL NUMBER OF MACHINES. TWO BRITISH PILOTS SAFE. (Received This Day. 9.55 a.m.) (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY. October 11. The Air Ministry announced: “It is now known that another enemy bomber was shot down yesterday, making five enemy aircraft destroyed during the day. Our losses yesterday were five planes but the pilots of two are safe.” 1