LARGE SECTION OF MAGINOT LIKE TAKEN

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 216, 12 September 1944, Page 5

LARGE SECTION OF MAGINOT LIKE TAKEN

DEFENCES INTACT Seventh And Third U.S. Army Troops Link Up Rec. 1.30 p.m. LONDON, Sept. 11. General Patton's American forces driving across Lorraine to-day captured a large part of the Maginot Line intact, states Reuters correspondent with the American Third Army. American infantry also took Aumetz, ten miles south-east of Longwy, three miles from the border of Luxemburg. It is the first Lorraine town to be liberated, the tricolour appearing over the town for the first time since Hitler incorporated Alsace-Lorraine into the Greater Reich in 1940. The Associated Press says that a chunk of the Maginot Line which the Americans occupied to-day contains big, electrically operated, disappearing French guns in perfect working order.

The British United Press correspondent says the United States Third Army at 8 a.m. to-day opened a new attack south of Nancy and reached the outer defences of the fortress of Nancy, where they captured Fort Villeyesac. Reuters correspondent says elements of the Third Army to-day met elements of General Patch's Seventh Army, which had driven up from the Riviera. It is officially announced that contact was made in the vicinity of Sombernon, on the main road from Dijon to Paris, and about 15 miles from Diion. Officers and men of the Seventh and Third Armies shook hands. Meanwhile, the Germans resisting the American efforts to force the Moselle to-day counter-attacked strongly at several points. The Associated Press says the American Seventh Army reached the outskirts of Vesoul, against which powerful American infantry forces converged. Vesoul is an important road junction m heavily wooded- country. The Germans if thev want to fight, should be able to offer a real battle before they are rooted out of the town which is situated on the natural escape route for the Germans west of the Belton Gap Vesoul is 45 miles from Belfort and 75 miles south of Nancy, where the Third -Army is sttscking the Moselle line.