FIFTH COLUMNISTS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 220, 16 September 1940, Page 3

FIFTH COLUMNISTS

B.E.F. HERO'S VIEW. "FINISHED IN ENGLAND." (By Air.) . SYDNEY, Sept. 14. The presence in Sydney of the B.E.F. detachment who came out as guards on the ship which brought British int?rnees to Australia hae aroused much interest in Sydney. Naturally, everything possible has been done to entertain them, including a trip up the Blue Mountains to Katoomba, where they were the heroes of the town. At a march past the Governor-General, Lord Gowrie, at the Sydney Showground, their fine bearing aroused spontaneous tributes from A.I.F. soldiers encamped there. The officer in charge, LieutenantColonel W. P. Scott, of the London Scottish Regiment, at a Legacy Club luncheon in Sydney, wade- some revealing references to Fifth Column activities in France and England. He said: "There were cases of a mayor of a village recouimending a house for billeting British troops. As soon as the troops settled down, the house blew up and none survived. In England the activities of the Fifth Columnists were much more sinister. 'In a sector where I was when the German bombers came over the coast we found that motor cars with glaring headlights advanced inland to guide the "German aircraft. When the lights were switched off the German pilots knew they were over their objective—which were searchlight groups and anti-aircraft batteries. "I am glad to say that, of four of these Fifth Columnists operating in my sector, two are in gaol and two are now no more. Now it matters not where you go in England; if you are a stranger you are watched aiul followed. The whole of England is eyes—eyes on the sky, eyes on the sea and eyes on strangers. The Fifth Columnist in England is finished. He has been conquered by the spirit and zeal of the civilian population." Colonel Scott eaid he was certain that if Hitler attempted to invade England it would end in "a crushing defeat for Germany and a bloody end of the war." He said it was the women of England) who had enlisted in large numbers as A.R.P. wardens, who had arouse! the public to a sense of their impending dangers. He declared that every man who had "been in the Dunkirk "show" would ac-knowledge that Providence had aided the British Army. He said that at firet a storm had prevented German bombers from attacking the British troops waiting on the beach to be iaken off. Then, when the "amazing fleet of miscellaneous vessels" put out from England to take the men off, there was a "miraculous calm."