MOVING SCENES

Evening Star, Issue 25470, 28 April 1945, Page 7

MOVING SCENES

FIRST MEETING ACCIDENTAL AMERICAN OFFICER AND RUSSSIAN PRIVATE (Rec. 1 p.m.) LONDON, April 27. General Bradley, in an order of the day to the Twelfth Army Group, said: " Marshal Koniev's armies have come to you from the ruins of Stalingrad and Sebastopol, and across the scorched cities of the Ukraine. In two years they smashed 1,400 miles through the German army to drive the enemy from Russia and pursue him to the Elbe. Their achievements are made the more full of meaning by your own deeds. Across 3,800 miles of ocean supply line you forced a coast the enemy for years had been preparing against you. Within four months since landing you have destroyed whole armies." Recalling that the Twelfth Army Group had advanced 700 miles from the beaches, General Bradley added: " The people of America had great faith in you—you have justified that faith, as you will in the battles that follow." Marshal Stalin personally read his message to the Allied and Russian armies over Moscow radio to-night. The first link-up between the Americans and Russians on Wednesday occurred by accident, says the British United Press correspondent with the Fjrst Army.

An American patrol of 20 men failed to receive orders to halt the advance, and walked into the Russian lines.

. American headquarters radioed the patrol, ordering it to halt five miles beyond the Mulde River, but the message was never received, and the patrol went on 23 miles to a point where the* Americans met the Russians. None of the Americans spoke Russian, but a lieutenant walked toward the Russians and thrust put his hand. One of the Russians grasped it warmly. The correspondent says history may record the official link-up at Torgau, but the men of this patrol have their own jdeas about that. They immediately flashed the news of the meeting back to the division, after which a lieutenant-colonel, accompanied by an interpreter, flew to the Russian lines, where they arranged the formal meeting of April 26. Swarms of fleeing German civilians and soldiers waiting to surrender continually impeded the patrol's advance. One German soldier said ho had been ordered not to shoot at the Americans, but to reserve his ammunition for the Russians HISTORIC MOMENT. An unshaven American lieutenant from California and a Russian private met on the sloping girders of the blown-out railway bridge spanning the Elbe (River near Torgau at 4.40 on April 25, as a prelude to the formal meeting between the commanders, says Renter's correspondent. Lieutenant W. Robertson, of Los Angeles, commented: "I did not know what to say to him, but I pounded him on the back, shook hands a couple of times, and said ' Hullo ' in English." The lieutenant's first conversation with a Russian officer was conducted in German through an American naval officer who had been a German prisoner and was making his

way to the American lines when he encountered the patrol. The American patrol, which consisted of the lieutenant and three privates, passed through 20 miles of uncleared German territory. At first they had difficulty in convincing the Russians that they were allies, because the previous day Germans had waved American flags to the Russians and then fired on them. Lieutenant Robertson broke into a chemist's shop in order to get red, white, and blue colouring matter with which to, make a ragged Stars and Stripes on a piece of white cloth. This improvised flag he waved from a tower on the bank of the river in Torgau. The Russians sent up coloured flares, and the two parties moved to the bridge, where Lieutenant Robertson found himself surrounded by Russian infantry. _ One man offered him a bottle of wine and a can of sardines'. PARTY TO GELEBRATE. The leader of the Russian patrol was Lieutenant Sylvashko, who, with a Russian major and captain, accompanied the Americans back to the American lines, where they met the divisional commander and his staff and more than 50 war correspondents. The party, to celebrate the link-up, went on to midnight. Afterwards Lieutenant Sylvashko and Lieutenant Robertson posed for photographs, shaking hands with the flags- of their two countries behind them.

The British United Press correspondent, describing the scenes at Torgau on April 26, said: " Tt looked something like a country fair, with" the Russian soldiers singing and playing Balalikas. Vodka was being passed around. Nobody understood what the other fellow was saying, but everyone was having a good time. Some Russians were showing the Americans how

their guns worked by firing them into the Elbe.

" Never during the war were such scenes enacted as at Torgau. Russians and Americans slapped each other on the back, gave each other bear-like hugs, and sat in the warm sunshine drinking champagne from beer mugs."