ANOTHER CASSINO

Auckland Star, Volume LXXVI, Issue 59, 10 March 1945, Page 5

ANOTHER CASSINO

BATTLE FOR XANTEN

Nazi Artillery Plastering Whole Area N.Z. Press Association—Copyright Rec. 1 p.m. LONDON, March 9. Describing the capture of Xanten, the Exchange Telegraph Company's correspondent says that German paratroopers turned this little fortress town into another Cassino. The British fought their way into the town late yesterday after getting around on three sides. They battled their way through the streets all night burning out paratroopers from defensive positions, fighting from one pile of rubble to the next. Strongpoints were reduced one after another, and most of. the town was cleared by this morning. The Britishers pushed east and southeast towards the Wesel crossing.

A Canadian Press correspondent says the Germans across the Rhine for five miles east and south of Wesel have massed the greatest concentration of artillery which the Canadian Army has ever faced, in an effort to prevent a crossing, which thev apparently fear. Meanwhile, to the north, the Germans in the Wesel pocket are now compressed into a triangle of 20 square miles. The better part of two paratroop divisions are holding the bridgehead with tremendous support from guns and mortars from both sides of the Rhine.

One front line dispatch says that German artillery and.mortars of all calibres are plastering the whole of the Xanten area. The concentrated fire is worse than anything at Caen or the Scheldt battles. Every British and Canadian advance is through a bursting curtain of high explosives. Allied gains are small. *

The British troops are mopping up Xanten, which is the western pivot of the pocket, and are now advancing beyond the town. Most of Bonninghardt is cleared. More ground was gained on the pocket's southern flank, where the Ninth Army is meeting stiff resistance.