TORCH OF RUIN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 November 1943, Page 4

TORCH OF RUIN

LIGHTED BY THE R.A.F. IN BERLIN. UNEXAMPLED DEVASTATION WROUGHT. (Received This Day, 12.40 p.m.) LONDON, November 24. A vivid picture of the Berlin holocaust resulting from the R.A.F. raids in two successive nights is gained from reports to the Swedish Press and stories told by travellers, who say whole districts are flattened by bombs and swept by uncontrollable fires. Arrivals from Germany pictured Berlin as “a flaming torch of ruin. - ' One traveller who arrived at Malmoe today said Berlin was in a terrible state, with tremendous fires burning throughout the city. The “Allehanda’s” Berlin correspondent reported that the entire area around the Lehrter Railway Station was “just a mass of flames.” Firefighters, weary after 48 sleepless hours, and handicapped by a lack of manpower, ■ had to struggle against suffocating smoke. Even this morning, members of the A.R.P. wereUtnable to control the fires or remove bodies. The Mittelstrasse, running parallel with the Unter Den Linden, was carpeted with incendiaries. The entire street was a river of flames.

Other eyewitnesses say the heat in some places was so fierce that people ’collapsed. Tens of thousands are leaving the city, some with only the clothes they are wearing. The toll of damage is growing. The University buildings were set on fire and burned through the day. The State Library was also set on fire. The Todt (war construction) organisation offices were badly damaged. The Wertheim department store, one of the greatest in Europe, is burning furiously. The store backs on to the Voss Strasse, in which the Reich Chancellery stands. Radio services seem completely disorganised.