EARLIER REPORTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 5, 5 July 1940, Page 8

EARLIER REPORTS

SEVEN PLANES DOWN

HIT-AND-RUN ATTACKS

DEFENCES BUSY ALL DAY

LONDON, July 4,

During daylight raids yesterday on England and Scotland the Germans made a series of hit-and-run attacks between dawn and dusk, dropping high-explosive, incendiary, and de-layed-action bombs.

It is stated officially that six persons were killed and eight injured.

Seven German bombers were brought down and others damaged. One crashed in a wood in the south-east of England, two of the crew being killed and two injured.

The engine driver on the train running between two southern towns who lost his life as a result of an enemy bomb was hit by a splinter and died in hospital.

Shortly after 7 p.m. Spitfires raced out to sea to intercept more raiders, which came over in relays flying at a

height of between 2000 and 3000 feet. The first raider which crossed the coast was shot down six minutes after the fighters took off, and one of the occupants parachuted and fell into the English Channel, where he was picked up by a British ship. Other bombers were met with an intense barrage from anti-aircraft guns and fierce fighter opposition, and one raider was last seen diving into the sea from a considerable height. It was a day of air battles over Britain. Repeated attacks were made over south-eastern England, and anti-air-craft artillery of all types along the coast blazed away periodically for several hours as German planes attempted to cross. Civilians in southeastern England assert that a German plane deliberately . attempted to machine-gun the population at one point, and there were also lively exchanges of machine-gun fire between planes and ground defences. The Germans made a bomb attack over the same area later in the night, and also again visited beaches which they had machine-gunned earlier in the day. One raider flew so low that soldiers opened fire with their rifles. A terrific anti-aircraft barrage caught a low-flying plane, whereupon the raider jettisoned his entire cargo of 12 heavy bombs, which demolished an empty house and fell in back gardens and roads, making huge craters.

The Air Ministry has issued its thousandth bulletin since the outbreak of the war, indicating the extensiveness of air activity, including R.A.F. operations over enemy territory, which continue uninterruptedly.