THE LINK-UP

Evening Star, Issue 25425, 5 March 1945, Page 5

THE LINK-UP

TWO ARMIES MEET GERMANS EVADE TRAP LONDON, March 1. A correspondent with our forces in Germany cables that the expected link-up of the Canadian First and American Ninth Armies took place on Saturday morning. The time lag imposed by the security blackout prevented an earlier despatch of his message. The correspondent . adds that there are signs of German evacuation ahead of the right flank of the Canadian Army front, lines of enemy vehicles having been seen heading towards the Rhine. The enemy has blown up three bridges over the Rhino between Neuss and Dusseldorif.

The link-up took place between Kevelaer and Geldern, the correspondent states. It was not made without considerable difficulty, as the retiring euemy left a large number of mines and booby traps behind. Describing the link-up between the British and Americans on the cratered road between Geldern and Kevelaer, Reuter's correspondent with the Canadian First Army says there was no wireless communication between the two forces before their meeting, and as a result what everybody feared most actually happened. A British column came under fire from what looked like Shermans. A British officer set out with a flag, crossed an open field under German machine-gun fire, and was about to shake hands with an American officer when German mortars crashed all round them. After that both sides turned their attention to the Germans.

American negroes who maimed the Shermans told the British officer: "We watched you all the way across the field. If you had made one funny move, we would have let you have it."

Reuter's correspondent points out that the link-up moans that the formerly British Second Army front has been pinched off. ' The junction olf the two armies coincided with the first major signs that the Germans had decided to withdraw from the Canadian front. The road to Wesel is now jammed with vehicles. Most of the Hochwald Forest is cleared, but the Germans are still resisting furiously east of it. At least 20,000 Germans t<»-night are trying to escape across the five bridges opposite the area in which British troops of the Canadian First Army have linked up with American Ninth Army cavalry.