HEROIC EXPLOITS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 March 1943, Page 4

HEROIC EXPLOITS

IN ASSAULT ON MARETH LINE 3 FORM ■ W OF WADI ZIGZOU. BRITISH CORPORAL'S VALIANT SACRIFICE. (Special P.A. Correspondent.) (Received This Day, 9.20 a.m.) LONDON. March 25. Mr Winston Churchill’s statement that Rommel had re-established the Mareth bridgehead came as a cold douche to the British public, after a general impression had been gained that the foundation of victory had been laid. As “The Times”’ points cut, the impression may still prove to be well-founded, but it looks as though the fight will be more furious and more stubborn than first reports indicated. The "Daily Telegraph’s’’ war correspondent at Allied headquarters expresses the opinion that the battle is developing according to General Alexander's plan. “The enemy,” he says, “is being forced to use his armour to plug four danger-spots—on the coast near • Mareth, inland, in the neighbourhood cf El Hamma, on the Gabes-Gafsa Road and in the Maknassi area. That means it is going to be extremely difficult for Rommel to concentrate for a full-scale blow against any one of these sectors.” Vivid stories are now being told of how the Eighth Army scaled the shellswept ravine of Wadi Zigzou. The "Daily Herald’s” correspondent, Mr Clifford Webb, says: “Human pyramids cf men, in battle dress, scaled the steep cliff of the wadi when the first defences of the Mareth line were pierced by specially-picked British troops. Under a concentrated fire of Axis field-guns, mortars and machine-guns, they carried scaling poles and eighteen-foot boards over the 1000-foot wide wadi bottom. Mud cozed about their feet and they sank up to their boot tops, so that every step was an effort. Mortar shells. and machine-gun bullets, firing on. fixed lines, swept every inch of ground, and three enemy strong points poured an enfilading wall of death along the line cf the Wadi, but the British went on.

HUMAN PYRAMIDS. Calmly and as neatly as they had done in a rehearsal behind the lines, they reached the edge of the ravine, formed themselves into human pyranjjds, and climbed, one over the other, towards the top. Within two hours of the attack opening, they had forced a bridgehead over what the enemy considered practically an impassable wadi. Again they went on, across an anti-tank djtch, with foot-high aprons of barbed wire, under water in its deeper parts, and strong belts of mines in the drier positions, fighting every inch of the way and climbing or crawling across tEeir hazardous planks with screaming death on all sides. Theirs was a feat that must live long in the annals of British heroism.” OUTSTANDING DEED. ;';,The story is told of the outstanding bravery of a corporal, who allowed himself to be shot to pieces in order to shield his men. A Bren-gun team of the corporal and three men went out to- silence an enemy pillbox. They advanced into the enemy fire' so that they could thrust the muzzle of a Brengun into one of the pillbox slits and shoot up the Germans inside. The Brengyn jammed six yards from the pillbox, leaving them defenceless. The Germans opened up with Spandaus, wounding the corporal and two of his men. A Manchester private, telling the story, said: “The corporal had been in front. He screwed round where he lay on the ground, and shouted: ‘Get behind me and you will be all right/ I crawled up close to him, and the other two dragged themselves ■ behind me. We were all sheltered by the corporal. The Germans emptied clip after clip into his body, so that he was practically shot to pieces, but he saved us.” The three privates remained behind their human barrier until other British troops stormed the pillbox from the other direction, wiping out the garrison. The corporal’s epitaph was writtcs by an officer, who said: “He used t&»be a miner earning a few quid a w?ek, and he was as game as the best WITHOUT RESPITE ENEMY TROOPS POUNDED FROM THE AIR. LUFTWAFFE COMPLETELY ; OUTCLASSED. ; (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 10.35 a.m.) RUGBY, March 25. •• The air pounding of enemy troops in Southern Tunisia continues on an unprecedented scale, according to Press reports. Bombing has been most accurate and immense damage has been done. When Mitchells attacked a landing ground near Jebel Sebeda, between Gabes and Sfax, in two successive sweeps, bombs burst among a concentration of forty to sixty aircraft. The perodrome of La Smala Des Sousassi was also raided, aircraft on the ground being sot on flrh and bombs bursting Among others. Over the battle area at El Guettar fighters and fighterbombers ceaselessly pounded transport, tanks and trucks. At least ten enemy transports were destroyed and other vehicles, including ten tanks were damaged. The two Allied air forces in North Africa are said to outnumber the Luftwaffe stationed in Tunisia, Sicily and Sardinia. Not one dive-bomber has been used against the Eighth Army for six months, because the losses have been too great. OFFICIAL BAN ’ ON NEWS OF FIGHTING IN SOUTH TUNISIA. CORRESPONDENTS ONLY TO GIVE BALD FACTS. 1 (Received This Day, 11.40 a.m.) LONDON, March 25. « Unofficial news from Tunisia is most Confusing. The Algiers radio, after staling that Rommel had failed to neutralise the Eighth Army’s salient, later announced that violent battles were in progress in the southern sector of the Mareth area, adding that further Axis counter-attacks retook positions lost in previous days. - In an earlier statement the radio said the most violent battle ever stagetFin Africa vzas in progress in the southern sector, where Rommel had

vainly since Tuesday, with successive waves of tanks and infantry, endeavoured to neutralise the salient the Eighth Army had established on the Mareth Line, but that the Eighth Army had maintained its bridgehead in fortified enemy positions. A British United Press correspondent at. Allied Headquarters says official silence has been clamped down on news of the operations on the Mareth Line, where savage fighting has continued. It was officially announced that nothing could be written about the Eighth Army except the bald facts listed in a communique. Correspondents were told that they should not speculate, draw conclusions or presume what the enemy might be attempting. The Columbia Broadcasting System’s Algiers correspondent says the German counter-attack in the Mareth coastal area seems to have been stopped, but most of General Montgomery’s first day gains appear to have been wiped out. The enemy’s fierce artillery fire and heavy tank onslaughts have certainly made it impossible for us to exploit the bridgehead in the enemy’s fortified zone. FLANKING MOVE HEIGHT NEAR EL HAMMA CAPTURED. ROMMEL’S TANKS MAULED BY AMERICANS. (Received This Day, 11.50 a.m.) LONDON, March 25. British forces have further advanced in the El Hamma sector (west of the Gabes gap). The Algiers radio says they have captured a height 71 miles south-west of Ell Hamma. Reuter’s Tunisia correspondent reports that the Germans in the Gafsa area suffered an important setback when American infantrymen and gunners stopped a big scale attack dead in its tracks. The Germans flung in a substantial force Of tanks against the American positions 10 to 15 miles eastward of REI Guettar, obviously intending to clear the Americans from the entire Gafsa sector, but. got nowhere. . f The Americans mauled some of Rommel’s tank units and showed that they have learned much since the Germans drove them back through the Kasserine Pass last month. German infantry and two panzer grenadier regiments took a terrific beating. The Americans have made slight progress eastward from Maknassi, but hard fighting is going on in an important area a little over six miles from Maknassi, just short of the point at which the road leads into the coastal plain. The Americans are consolidating and digging in on high ground called the Djebel Boudabou. The First Army, in North Tunisia, made a slight advance. British troops recaptured Djebel Dahere, three miles north-west of Djebel Aboid.