TRIBUTES TO R.A.F.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 November 1941, Page 6

TRIBUTES TO R.A.F.

IN LETTERS FROM FRANCE EXAMPLES OF EFFECTIVE ATTACKS. HONOUR PAID TO BRAVE DEAD. Many letters coming out of France speak of the effective work of the R.A.F. The following is one of these. It also mentions the tribute paid by the French to our brave dead. “I Was in occupied territory, . at Havre,” says the writer. “For a whole year I saw Germans every day, and the swastika flag on French public buildings. The Germans had installed themselves everywhere, in the administrative buildings, in the barracks, in the hospitals, for they needed plenty of room to prepare for the invasion of England. “British planes come over often and always hit the right spots. Thus a train of German soldiers on leave left Havre one morning about 9 o’clock. Twenty miles from the town a British plane dived down and stopped the locomotive. Then it came back and calmly shot up the whole train from a few feet up. “The inhabitants of Havre feel no resentment against the R.A.F. for damage caused; they nearly always hit military objectives. I was near an aerodrome when it was bombed. One plane was brought down, but the crew were killed. ‘Their bodies were taken to the hospital mortuary. Everyone in the hospital came to pay silent homage to the dead, and the coffins were soon covered with flowers and crowds attended the funeral. “The Germans punished the town by 45 meatless days. But everyone was proud and happy at having been able to honour the brave dead.”