REPORTED 'DEATH HOLE'

STORY FROM TRIESTE UNTRUE

(Special P.A. Correspondent.)

LONDON, August 3,

A story of 400 corpses found in a "death hole" at Basovizza, five miles outside Trieste, is untrue, says a special correspondent of the "Manchester Guardian." The allegation was made by the Roman news agency that the village was the scene of the disinterment by the Allied military authorities of 400 bodies of Italians and Germans and 10 New Zealanders from a deep The correspondent spent several hours visiting the pits and a coal shaft. He says that the New Zealand 7th Field Engineer Company threw a small Bailey bridge over this shaft. A cable was let down and the shaft was "found to be 600 feet deep. An experimental descent was made by a New Zealarider, but he was almost overpowered by the stench. A diver in full kit was let down, and he brought up fragments of flesh, human clothing, and German ammunition boxes, and stated that the place appeared to be a gigantic dump, with remains of human beings and horses. A fortnight ago the operations, which never at any time produced more than these fragments, were suspended, and now all the New Zealanders have left this region. Allied headquarters has taken over the Basovizza shaft and the place is being thoroughly investigated The' correspondent declares that the story about the disinterment of 400 corpses is a complete fabrication, as also is a report that the Bishop of Trieste and the Patriarch of Venice arranged for the burial of the corpses in a suitable place.