THE SOUTHERN FRONT

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 68, 18 September 1944, Page 5

THE SOUTHERN FRONT

THRUST TOWARDS VOSGES

LONDON, September 16. On the southern part of the front General Devers's newly-established Sixth Army Group advancing towards the Vosges is still too far Horn the defences to be an immediate threat, but evidently a build-up on a very big scale is in progress opposite the southern part of the West Wall. The Allied troops are now thrusting eastward along a 500-mile front from the Swiss frontier south of Belfort to the Channel coast. Near the Swiss border Allied troops advancing from southern France have made further progress since contact was established near Dijon with patrols from our forces operating to the north. Elements have pushed to the vicinity of Fays-Billot. North-west of Dijon we have reached Montbard, in the Brenne Valley; and Chatenois, six miles from Neufchateau has been captured. The American Third and Seventh Armies have reached Belfort, according to a Reuter correspondent. He says that the German l}2th Panzer Brigade has been almost completely knocked out as a fighting force by General Patton's forces near Epinal, and is no longer able to function.

The Third Army in the thrust to | Nancy is estimated to have killed 4000 uermans and taken 3500 prisoners. The Germans launched three violent coun-ter-attacks against our lines in the vicinity of Pont de Mousson, on the Moselle, midway between Nancy and Metz, but all were stemmed. .The American armour which crossed the Moselle has wheeled north to cut behind Metz in a manoeuvre that threatens to outflank the town, says •li SS°S, a.ed Press correspondent with the Third Army. The Americans in the Nancy area are driving north on the eastern side of the Moselle. A lhird Army spokesman said* "The

battle of the Moselle has taken a definite turn in our favour, though there is still hard fighting ahead." There is artillery duelling across the river in the Thionville area, where the Third Army holds part of the town on the western bank of the Moselle. Krupp guns and ammunition captured ma section of the Maginot Line are being used to shell the German positions at Thionville.

French troops were responsible for the destruction of an enemy column south of Fays-Billot. They caught ths> column proceeding in a north-easterly direction and destroyed every vehicle m it killing 200 Germans and capturing 160, and also capturing four 88mm guns.

Rec. 11 a.m. LONDON, September 17. Minor sporadic German counterattacks are screening the general German withdrawal from the Moselle area according, to front-line reports, says' Reuters correspondent. Intense fighting is going on in the vicinity of Metz, with American armour attacking from the south and infantry from the north Additional troops crossed the Meurthe River immediately east of Nancy, closing the German pocket of troops caught petween the town and the American troops some 14 miles to the east