DAY RAID ON LONDON

Evening Star, Issue 24409, 22 January 1943, Page 3

DAY RAID ON LONDON

AIR BATTLES OVER STREETS WOMEN AND CHILDREN AMONG VICTIMS LONDON, January 20. The Germans used about 130 planes in to-day's daylight attacks on London and the south-east coast area. One hundred of the planes were fighters and the remainder fighter-bombers. The lighters turned back on reaching the coast, leaving the bombers to dash inland. One group raced up the Thames Estuary and across parts of Kent. Some circled the capital's outskirts, and others went on, dropping bombs at various points. Numerous air battles were fought over London's streets, but most of the dogfights occurred over the Channel. It is now believed that only six filter-bombers penetrated the London area. After bombing London, one of them crashed in Dorking (Surrey), and the pilot was taken prisoner-. Ten children and six women who were killed in one London district included 'a mother and her four daughters, aged between three and 13. The woman s husband, who is a member of the A.R.P., helped to recover the bodies. Three babies asleep in cots above a cafe were killed, and a* number of the cafe's customers injured. Several W.A.A.F.s on duty a£ a balloon site were wounded when a raider swooped down with guns blazing. -An officer said the W.A.A.F.s behaved magnificently, and those not wounded assisted their comrades until an ambulance arrived. Several W.A.A.F.s at another balloon site were injured when they were trapped the blazing remnants of a balloon which a raider, shot down.

A bomb fell in a contractor's yard, killing three people. Three raiders dived low in another district and demolished a bank and two public' houses. Nine bodies were recovered, and it is feared that many are under the debris. Bullets killed three workmen in another district, and several .were killed fWhen a bomb fell in a garage in a '• thickly-populated district.