PILES OF DEAD

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 76, 26 September 1941, Page 6

PILES OF DEAD

LENINGRAD FIGHTING

BOTH SIDES SUFFER HEAVY LOSSES

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS

(By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright.)

(Rec. 2 p.m.) LONDON, Sept. 25,

Although the German threat to Kharkov, and the drive against the Crimea each constitutes a development embracing momentous possibilities, it is the mighty struggle for Leningrad upon which the attention of anxious millions all over

the world is concentrated.

The Stockholm correspondent of "The Times," referring to the fact that not only the Germans but also the Russians mention fighting in outlying districts of Leningrad, says that the most trustworthy information seems to indicate that these encounters are not really in Leningrad's suburbs, but within a dozen miles of them, at Peterhof and/or Strelna. It is understood that advanced German troops crossed the river at Strelna, some miles inland, at the beginning of the week, but that a Russian counter-attack drove them back to the western bank of the Neva, after the bloodiest hand-to-hand fighting with bombs and bayonets. Both Berlin and Moscow mention gigantic piles of dead. Each gives the impression that these are enemy dead, and judging from the latest reports both are right.

A CONFUSED POSITION,

A Russian report describes how the enemy was thrown back across the Dvina after four days of fighting. This occurred in the hotly-disputed Veliki Yeluki sector, where both sides have alternatively claimed the initiative since August and where the position remains confused.

Little is reliably known about the position in the Kiev sector, and thence to the, Black Sea, except that the Rumanians have again suffered heavily in abortive attempts to reach the approaches to Odessa. : "The Times",says that reports from a neutral military source; declare that the flood resulting from the destruction of the Dnieper Dam washed away and almost annihilated five Rumanian divisions.

The latest information from the Murmansk sector suggests that German mountain troops are feverishly trying to recover from the serious discomfiture which they suffered in an encounter with strong Russian outposts last weekend.

According to Swedish correspondents, the Finns, crossing the Svir River at several points east of Lake Ladoga, have deprived the Russians of three or four power stations which contribute to. Leningrad's supply. Attacks towards Petrozavodsk are continuing, with intensive air support. The' Finns evidently aim to control the Murmansk railway between Petrozavodsk and Svir.

The front on the Karelian Isthmus has been static since the Finns reached the old frontier.