GREAT VICTORY

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 100, 30 April 1945, Page 5

GREAT VICTORY

Allies In Italy

BTH ARMY CLOSE TO VENICE

LONDON, April 2&

The sth and Bth Armies have won a great victory by smashing the deep line of concrete defences beyond the Adige River, and the way to Venice is open. Eighth Army troops are reported five miles from Venice. '.-■.'■ 'v

Rome radio stated that partisans have taken possession of th* greater part of Venice. "

Vicanza and Padua have been occupied. Padua is just 20 miles from Venice. ;;

The victory of the Venetian line means that the last strong German defence position in Italy has been smashed. It comes just three.weeks after the Bth Army launched the spring offensive. In: that time, two German armies, with some of the cream of the enemy; troops, have been broken. ; "'

Ahead of the Allied armies, Italian patriots have driven out some of the German garrisons and captured others to save them demolishing power stations, factories, and water supplies in a score of towns and cities.

Rome radio broadcast tonight a message from General Mark Clark to Italian patriots in north Italy. The message warned them not to believe stories. that fighting had ended in Piedmont and Lombardy. There was still a serious German menace, and at. least two German divisions were .still at large. He called on the patriots to help the Allied advance by attacking and blocking German units.

Allied headquarters in Italy announced this evening that sth Army troops have driven into Milan,^ already liberated, by Italian partisans. The church bells were rung by order of the Cardinal Archbishop. The people of the city covered their buildings with the flags of the United Nations. They had been told earlier by the patriot radio to fill every window and every inch of pavement to greet the entry of the friendly and victorious troops. . Today's Mediterranean communique confirms the arrival of American tanks 20 miles north of Milan at Como, near the Swiss frontier. Troops of the sth Army, in their drive to the Brenner Pass, have reached the northern end of Lake Garda, little more than 70 miles from the southern gateway of Hitler's redoubt. '